470 THE LAST YEAKS 



had known my wife as a girl. We inhabited there a cottage 

 charmingly furnished, and rented by my son, the Captain i 

 India, who is devoted to the place and dreams of retirin 

 there 20 years hence ! I tell him that he reminds me o 

 the many Indian friends I knew, who dreamt of retirin 

 to their old homes in the Highlands and Lowlands, an 

 whom I found spending their last years in Bayswater an 

 S. Kensington ! 



I rejoice that you can feel free from any chronic paii 

 I hope you may yet walk a little with a stick. It may amu? 

 you to hear that my cousin, Mr. Inglis Palgrave, who wa 

 knighted the other day, wrote me previously in dismay, sa} 

 ing that if he had to kneel to receive the accolade he coul 

 never get up again ! I told him to take a walking- stic] 

 and lent him a nice ebony one that he used, and the gooc 

 natured King seeing his difficulty had him helped by some ( 

 the attendants. He is over 80. 



Old interests were again revived by a letter from M 

 T. D. La Touche, son of his old friend, with descriptions ( 

 Sikkim and recent changes in the country. 



To T. D. La Touche 



July 8, 1909. 



My dear Mr. La Touche, — I thank you very much f< 

 your long and interesting letter of the 4th inst. from Jongi 

 The contents have intensely interested me, recalling so mar 

 scenes once familiar to me. The Oscillations of the Glacie 

 must be very difficult to determine, for in most cases tk 

 debouche in narrow valleys, not as in Switzerland in opt 

 meadows or flats. I think that the Lachen and Lachui 

 Glaciers would serve your purpose better than the Westei 

 ones. 



What you tell me of the destruction of forests, the spree 

 of cultivation, export of maize, the dying out of the Lepcl 

 and his replacement by the Nepalese, and the rarity i 

 Murwa beer, are all shocks to me. 



The improvement of the roads alone gratifies me, and 

 could certainly put up with the bridges, and the diminutic 

 of the leech attacks. I hope too that the ticks which I mo 

 especially abominated, are less accessible to the traveller. 



