RADEN SALEH, THE ARTIST. 221 



Afghanistan, extols its fruits as the rarest and most 

 delicious in flavour, they being, moreover, so plentiful 

 that people were allowed to enter the gardens and 

 pluck and eat them. Each visitor was weighed as he 

 entered and again as he returned, and paid at a fixed 

 rate the difference in weight. This seems a more 

 equitable process than that adopted now in many parts 

 of Switzerland, where, during the grape season, people 

 are allowed to have their fill at one uniform rate, 

 generally half a franc. If a similar arrangement were 

 universally adopted, fruit stalls would soon be com- 

 pelled to close their establishments for want of cus- 

 tomers. 



Taking an early drive one beautiful morning, I 

 reached a spot where there was a delicious clear pond 

 under the friendly shade of an enormous fig-tree — a 

 temptation to bathe which I could not resist, and 

 thus refreshed, I proceeded to a neighbouring village 

 to deliver an introduction to Prince Raden Saleh, a 

 native artist of some repute, who had passed many 

 years in Europe. His friend and patron was the 

 reigning Prince of Coburg Gotha. Subsequently 

 Raden Saleh was received at most of the European 

 courts. He still prided himself upon his success in 

 the highest society, and would have liked you to believe 

 that an English Miss actually poisoned herself out of 



