114 DIARY OF A SPORTSMAN NATURALIST 



some biscuits. The refreshment was very comforting, but 

 gloom held the Commissioner for some time. I could not 

 make out why. But when he shouted out an enquiry as to 

 whether the boats were arriving I began to understand the 

 position. He was thinking of the dinner. It was then 

 nearly eight o'clock. Another hour passed and still no 

 boats. We had both spent it in silence over a book apiece, 

 but at the end of this period the hunger pangs became more 

 insistent. The Commissioner went out into the verandah 

 and remained the best part of the next hour there. Being 

 a junior officer and also a guest I felt the position to be a 

 rather delicate one. At ten o'clock an enquiry was made 

 as to what provisions we had. It turned out that a solitary 

 bottle of beer and a couple of biscuits was the total strength 

 of the commissariat. 



Hungry as from my own sensations I do not doubt he was, 

 I think my companion was more annoyed on account of his 

 guest than for himself. And, besides, for a Commissioner's 

 bundobast to go wrong in a country where he held powers of 

 life and death was an unheard-of event ! At 10.30 he said 

 we might as well have what there was, and we solemnly 

 divided the bottle of beer and ate a biscuit apiece and 

 decided to turn in, i.e. lie down on the bedsteads all standing 

 for we had no bedding or anything else till the boats arrived, 

 and it was too cold to take off one's boots. 



I buckled up my leather belt to the last hole to still the 

 hunger pangs and lay down, with my topi for a pillow. For 

 nearly an hour sleep refused to come near me, and then I 

 fell into a deep slumber. I dimly heard or dreamt of 

 noises and of a voice saying " Sahib, Khana tiyar hai " 

 (Dinner is ready) and I seemed to smell appetizing smells, 

 but the real facts were that I slept till 6.30. I woke then 

 to find my servant at my bedside with a tray full of a large 

 chota hazri. I noted too that I had been covered up 

 during the night with blankets. As soon as my eyes opened 

 the gnawing pain came back and without question I 

 devoured the victuals. I was told that the boats had turned 

 up about I a.m. with a fine hot five-course dinner ready. 

 (They said they got stuck on a sandbank in the dark). The 

 Commissioner, who was awake, had his dinner brought to 

 his bedside and ordered mine to be taken to me. They 

 reported to him, however, that they could not wake me and 

 were told to leave me alone. We ought to have got off at 



