18 THE INDIAN ECLIPSE, I 



comfortable and well-appointed as everything was there, there 

 was nothing in which better provision had not been made for 

 our comfort than for theirs. We mentioned the flag as the one 

 solitary point in which our camp was the inferior ; and on the 

 next day but one our standard, of fully twice the size of that at 

 Pulgaon, floated proudly from the tree above our mess tent, and 

 gave a larger corona to the breeze. Besides the flag we could 

 think of nothing whatsoever but the white stones that marked 

 out the paths from tent to tent at Pulgaon. This was a refine- 

 ment which we really did not need in our camp, as our paths 

 were carefully cut ; but the omission, if such it could be called, 

 was at once repaired, and long lines of white stones marked out 

 all our ways before a second sunset. 



DEVELOPING HUT, TALNI CAMP. 



Later on in the week we received a visit from Mr. Elrington, 

 the Superintendent of Telegraphs at Nagpur, who gave us a 

 most material piece of assistance by arranging that we should 

 have a special telegraph station at Talni for the day of the 

 eclipse and for a day or two before and after. Otherwise it 

 would have been necessary for one at least of our party to have 

 taken the afternoon train to Wardha, twenty-five miles down 

 the line, and to have returned about midnight. On Friday this 

 temporary telegraph office was opened for the first time, and we 

 received time signals from Madras at four o'clock in the after- 

 noon. As we drove down to the railway station we met on 

 the road, usually so completely deserted, an endless procession 

 of natives; many of them the servants of the Eesident from 



