Miss Eden's Letters Part 39

E. E.

_Miss Eden to the Countess of Buckinghamshire._

CALCUTTA, _June 1, 1841._

MY DEAREST SISTER, You can hardly have the cruelty to expect a poor creature to write after three weeks of the most desperate weather ever felt in India, and no signs of a change. Even the natives are completely beat by it. The Baboos say they can't write, and the tailors can't sew, and I see the man who is pulling the punkah has a large fan in the other hand with which he is fanning himself. Even George owns to falling asleep over his work; and then the evenings are so hot we cannot drive, which is unwholesome for him. Under these circ.u.mstances it is rather difficult to write.

f.a.n.n.y left a letter for you before she went. They have been gone a week to-day, and therefore ought to be at Singapore to-morrow. I heard from her on Wednesday evening when the pilot left them, just gone to sea, and she said she felt better, though the heat had been dreadful in the river, and that it was the quietest ship she had ever been in, and that William [Osborne] was very contented, etc.; and Sir Gordon wrote word she was in excellent spirits. If they find a ship ready to start from Singapore they may be back in less than five weeks, and at all events in six, and I am sure they will have had a blessed miss of any part of this month. I rather hope they will make a week's more delay, and go and see Penang when they are about it. Everybody says it is so beautiful.

In the meanwhile, I take it we are going to bring her and Sir Gordon and the whole ship's company into the Supreme Court, I believe, and probably transport them all. The captains of three several ships have all come storming up the river, declaring that Sir Gordon fired upon them because they did not salute his pennant quick enough to please him; and one captain has brought two _b.a.l.l.s_, one of which pa.s.sed between him and his pilot, and the other went through the cabin full of pa.s.sengers. As they were arriving from England, not thinking of finding a Commodore, and certainly not expecting to find him on board a steamer tugging another ship, it is rather sharp practice firing at all; but firing loaded guns is quite a new idea. I hope it will not be proved that f.a.n.n.y has been popping away out of her cabin on these unsuspecting new arrivals. Sir Gordon is always amazingly on the alert about his dignity; and having detained _The Queen_ a day in order that he might attend the birthday ball, went to bed before supper. It was supposed from some jealousy about the Members of Council taking precedence of him.

I cannot think Charles Elliot and he, by clubbing all the intellect they have, will ever be a match for one Chinese, even of a very pale-coloured b.u.t.ton, or indeed an unb.u.t.toned Mandarin, if there is such an improper character.

Our Queen's ball was very magnificent, and, as I fondly hope it is our last, I am glad it went off so well. I _wore my diamonds!_ I think that sounds well, so the particulars will remain a mystery, but they really looked very well, and George bought a beautiful row of pearls the other day which he _lends_ me. We had Dost Mahomed and his sons and suite at the ball, the first time he had ever seen European ladies in their _shameless_ dress; but he did not see the dancing; George took him into another room. He is a very kingly sort of person, and carries off his half-captive, half Lion position with great tact. By way of relieving George part of the evening, I asked him to play at chess, and we played game and game, which was rather a triumph, considering the native chess is not like ours, and he kept inventing new rules as we went on. I somehow think if he were not a Dost it was not quite fair.

I opine this weather is having an excellent effect on George's mind. The most opinionated Governor-General never could dream of staying another year after having been done to a turn--I may say rather overdone now, and I cannot think that he _is_ thinking of it, only the letter from England frightened him. But he declares that he wrote home for a successor two months ago. Mr. Colvin, who is as anxious to go home as I am, was in his room when I went there just now, and we made an invited poke, which elicited an explicit answer that he meant to go home, barring any extraordinary accident. I do not know how there could be any accident more extraordinary or more fatal than our staying here another year, and I feel we shall go.

Whenever I am too much beat by the weather even to take a book, I find I am always thinking of packing and tin cases, and whether the railroad from Portsmouth is not a horrid conveyance; and I never dream of anything that is not purely English.

Law! Sister, there is such a gale of wind it has actually blown open a window by breaking an iron bar, and the rain is coming down like smoke, and I rather think, but cannot be sure, that I am coming to life. Of course it is not the actual rains, but they must come in a fortnight, and this is a blessing for an hour.

My new dog is a total failure. I still call him mine, but Captain Macintosh takes care of him. I have been offered another, but I know nothing will do after Chance.

Take care of Dandy and yourself. Ever your most affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to the Countess of Buckinghamshire._

CALCUTTA, _July 18, 1841._

MY DEAREST SISTER, At first I scorned your spiteful imputation that I had not written to you by the April mail, but upon looking back into my littel boke of dates, I found it was true, and now I only wonder how you found it out. I see that it is for some years the first month I have missed writing, and for fear the case should occur again, I strongly advise that you should seal up two or three of my old Indian letters, if you can find them; and desire Streeton to bring one in on a silver waiter at the proper time. You will be quite taken in, for I have a deep conviction that my letters have all been copies one of the other, so one on the old pattern will seem quite natural to you.

Those horrid English letters of June 4 came in yesterday. They always give me a low day, but this was worse than ever. I had made up my mind that the Whigs were to be out and the Tories naming another Governor-General. I do not now think the dissolution will help them much, but others say it may, and now they have sent out full powers to George to try and mend up that Chinese mess, and he thinks that if the Whigs stay in, that he will be obliged to stay on. However, I did nothing but cry about it yesterday, and now to-day I see it all quite differently. I don't think they will stay, nor he, nor we, and so I won't bother you about it till I see things more dispa.s.sionately. We are to have another post in before ours goes, and that will show the turn the elections are going to take, and I think--I am not sure--but I _think_ I can live on in the hope of that post settling our return. I always believe for the best, and this would be such a disappointment that I have a sort of faith it _cannot_ happen, and so let us talk of something else.

I am glad Hazlewood's visit was not very fatiguing. He is a good-hearted creature, and a shocking martyr to his wounds, but he has not half an idea in his head, and I rather thought it a bold thing to introduce him.

But I daresay the pleasure to him was greater than the bore to you, and that is the way to balance those things. And then, all Indians dote on a live Countess. A stuffed one they would look up to, but a live one is really a treat.

How is Dandy? Zoe, my new dog, is decidedly a treasure, marked just like the lamented Chance, but smaller, and she does not interfere with my respect to his memory, as she has no talents and no temper, but is _creepmousey_, and cares for nothing and n.o.body but me, and requires constant petting--a familiarity Chance did not admit of. She is unluckily not used to the climate, and Brown, our coachman, who is probably disgusted at having to doctor her so often, said to me yesterday, "She is a nice little pet, ma'am, but I think the delicacy of her health will give you a great deal of trouble." Just as if it were a delicate baby.

We had a sad incident amongst the pets yesterday. Captain Thurlow was in William's room, and was looking at some of his daggers and playing with William's great bloodhound. William was called out of the room, upon which Nero laid hold of poor Captain Thurlow's nose and bit it quite through. They say he would have bit it off, if he had not been _in play_. But in the meanwhile Thurlow is bit and Nero sent away, an event that delights George, who always thought him an unsafe pet.

_August_ 11, 1841.

Think of that being written three weeks ago, and Thurlow was at Barrackpore three weeks ago in attendance on his General, and his nose so dreadful that, though he only appeared by candle-light, and that for the first time since his accident, his poor dear nose made me so squeamish I could not touch a morsel of dinner. However, they say it will come right in time, but if it had been Thurlow's dog and William's nose, George was wondering when he should have heard the last of it.

You will see our China news, which George thinks very good as far as it goes. Charles Elliot is supposed again to have interfered too much _against_ fighting, and to favour the Chinese pride as much as ever, and the Army and Navy are both as bitter against him as the merchants; but George is so thankful that our 2,000 men should have got out of the sc.r.a.pe of attacking 47,000 without utter destruction, that he is rather pleased. And then the million and a half of our money is a great point, the more so that he has just heard that four million and a half of dollars will be here in a week, just when money was most wanted.

I have had a long letter from Mrs. Elliot who had been at Canton before this attack, and out shopping where no English lady ever shopped before.

She has picked up some curiosities of an expensive kind for George, and some smaller ones for me, and f.a.n.n.y has got a boxful from an American to whom she gave a commission, and just because we want to unpack our little goods, it is a Hindu holiday and the Custom House is shut. Do the Hindu holidays annoy you much? But of course they do; we always felt alike.

Poor Mrs. Elliot has had a trying life of it lately. She seems pleased with this Canton business, and it is the best point at which Charles could meet his recall. I imagine from some letters of his which George showed me that it will not be a surprise to him, and he means to show the world, etc., how right he has been. I foresee a long life of pamphlets, don't you?

No other English post come in, but I think we have quite satisfied ourselves that the Whigs cannot stay and we shall go in February at latest. I have heard from Captain Grey, to whom I wrote to ask what accommodation he could give us in the _Endymion_. He says, smaller than the _Jupiter_, but he thinks he can take us all. We shall be fewer by Mars[507] married; Chance, dead; and Fop, William's greyhound, also dying of old age. I wonder whether we have only been here six years. I imagine we are all dying of old age sometimes, and that we have been here the usual Indian terms of twenty-one years.

_August 16, 1841._

The July post come in--the Elections all wrong, and so our going home is certain. George sends his resignation by this post, and in February we sail. G.o.d bless that dear post for bringing us such good news and so quickly. I am still an excellent Whig, but there is much pleasure in Opposition. And then the delight of going home! Good-bye, Sister; I'm coming directly. Just stop one minute while I draw my ship up your river. I really believe George is rather sorry, but he says not, and he is an honourable man. Your affectionate

E. E.

[Captain Elliot had been unjustly blamed for the management of the expedition to China. He was recalled by Lord Palmerston for disobedience to his instructions, and on his return to England he found Lord Aberdeen had become Foreign Secretary. Elliot's explanation of his conduct was satisfactory, and he completely cleared his character.]

_Miss Eden to the Countess of Buckinghamshire._

CALCUTTA, _September 10, 1841._

MY DEAREST SISTER, I have never felt such unwillingness to set off letter writing as this month, and it will be worse and worse and worsted for the next three, and then I shall be ready to write a line to say we are going on board, and after that I never mean to write to you again--never. I am tired of it, and besides, mean to pa.s.s the rest of my life with you. What a horrid prospect for you to find me always tugging after you with a long languid Indian story, only diversified by requests for a large fire and shut windows. I would not be you on any account.

Besides, think of the obtuseness with which we shall meet each other's topics. I beg to apprise you at once that I do not remember the botanical name of any one single flower; so don't expect it. I have gone back to the old childishness of roses, wallflowers, and carnations, and beyond that I cannot charge my memory.

I have been ornamenting the garden with some stone vases that the natives make very prettily, and just at the proper moment, Fop, William's old greyhound, died, so I buried him _symmetrically_ opposite to Chance, and Captain FitzGerald has put two ornamental vases over the two dogs, with a slight tendency to the funereal urn about their design for the consolation of my hurt feelings, and yet sufficiently like flower vases to deceive the Tory Governor-General, so that he cannot be spitefully tempted to pull them down again. Zoe, my new dog, is very pretty and very small, but certainly with none of the genius of her predecessor. In fact, between friends, she is rather dull, but she is such a little helpless thing that n.o.body can help coaxing her, and I could not expect two Chances in one life. George rather affections her, though he says he thinks a black bottle full of hot water would be quite as good as Zoe sitting on his lap, and full as lovely. Every morning in the auction papers there is a list of "Europe toys" for children, and I found one called a black cloth dog, defective, which is clearly another Zoe for sale. However, all this is only a hypocritical jest. I am very fond of her; and I a.s.sume you think that if anything happened to Dandy, you would be obliged to try a successor. One wants something of the sort.

Sir Jasper[508] and all the Nicolls family are on the point of setting off for their march through India. Lady Nicolls has done it once before and is fully awake to its horrors, and the young ladies do not like leaving Calcutta, but Lady Nicolls looks so ill that it is lucky she is going. They are a nice English family, and will be a loss here. The married daughter from Madras arrived last week with the first grandchild. Such a hideous little baby--but they are all in such ecstasies with it. I went there this morning and found our Miss Nicolls with the thermometer at 1000, I believe, walking up and down the room with the baby, away from the punkah because they thought it made the child sneeze. The perspiration was streaming down her face, and there was old Sir Jasper in a white jacket snapping his fingers and saying, Bow, wow, wow, and then rushing back to the punkah and saying he really could not stand the heat, but perhaps the baby with her cold had better not venture near the punkah. I believe the child was boiled; it looked like it. I think I ought to be excused a few small sins for the merit of going to the Nicolls this hot day.

There is an old blind General of 98 at Barrackpore, and his wife (who is 84) has just been couched, and sees with one eye, which is the only eye they have between them, and now the old man is going to be couched, and their pet doctor is ordered off with one of the marching regiments. They applied for an exchange for the doctor, which Sir Jasper refused, and the old lady came crying about it to Barrackpore last week; but I did not think I could well ask for it. However, she wrote a moving letter yesterday, and it is so hard at 90 and 80 to be thwarted in one of the very few wishes one can form, that I took courage, and set off this morning and expounded the case to Sir Jasper, who is very good-natured, and I rather think will do what they want. Sir Henry Fane would have snapped anybody's nose right off who had asked him for any favour of the sort. It will make the old Morleys very happy. The glare was so great that I think I shall have to be couched too; but that, of course, the doctor will do gratis. My eyesight is shockingly bad--I mean even for my age--and I have a strong and decided preference for large print.

I quite forget what one does of an evening in England. Here we dine at eight and go to bed at ten, so a short game at cards after coffee fills up the time, and n.o.body can read by the flickering lights here. Perhaps you will play at Beg-of-my-Neighbour with me; and then we shall step out, and smell the night-blooming stock in that little round border by the breakfast-room, and listen to the nightingales, and then go to bed, and I hope you will tell the bearers not to go to sleep when they are pulling the punkah in the company-room, because that wakes me.

Dear me! I sometimes feel very English just now, but ungainly, and with an idea that you will all laugh at us. I remember so well seeing all the Lowry Coles[509] debark at Lord de Grey's from the Cape, and they were very unlike other people, and had very odd bonnets on.

_September 15._

This must go. We have had a hard-working week,--a great farewell dinner to the Nicolls, and then to attend a play which Sir Jasper bespoke, and which lasted till near one. We luckily did not go till ten, but the audience who had sat there since eight were nearly dead, and we were all horribly hard-worked. Then I have been making a sketch of Dost Mahomed and his family, and he set off this morning for the Upper Provinces, leaving me with one of his nephews unsketched. So this morning, with immense activity I got up early, and Colvin abstracted the nephew from the steamer and brought him to sit for his picture before breakfast. The nephew is very like the picture of Judas Iscariot. They are all very Jewish, but he is a fine subject, and considering Colvin had had no breakfast, he seemed to talk Persian with wonderful animation. Ever, dearest Sister, yours most affectionately,

E. EDEN.

_Miss Eden to the Countess of Buckinghamshire._

BARRACKPORE, _October 8, 1841._

MY DEAREST SISTER, It is time to be writing again. Only three, or, at most four times more. It makes me yawn and stretch, with a sort of nervous shivering--just as one used to feel as a child the morning before going to the play with the idea that by some particular mischance _that_ day never would come to an end, or that the theatre would tumble down, or somebody take our box. I have those theatrical misgivings and yearnings about the next three or four months, and I wish the September post would come, just to make sure that the new Governor-General[510] is a man of active _packing_ habits. I want to go in February. They say now that going in March makes such a long voyage. I think it is rather lucky that this month's news did not go home by last month's mail. That sounds Irish, because, as you justly observe, it is not so easy to advance a month's news as it might be a month's allowance; but there is George with his predatory habits up to the ears in preparation for a Burmese war, and if that news had got home in time, the Court of Directors would probably have made a strong objection to a change of rulers at the beginning of a war.