134 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



allowed to escape, which all — at least all the natives — 

 were bent upon doing. 



Great preparations had been made by our servants for 

 the feeding of these crowds, who were frightened to death 

 at the prospect before them, and now the dreaded day had 

 come ; the compound was thronged ; everything was in 

 readiness, and the doctor and his Eurasian assistants had 

 arrived from the hospital. 



Our system of vaccination might be new to these people, 

 but not the idea of inoculating one disease in order to combat 

 or forestall another. That is centuries old, and they were 

 familiar with its attendant dangers ; it was, in fact, the 

 thought of those dangers that now so terrified them. ' Well 

 took physic, fell sick, and died ' is a saying that might be 

 remembered sometimes to much advantage. We, too, had 

 heard hideous stories of disease contracted through tainted 

 lymph, but we were assured that all precautions had been 

 taken, and that the vaccine was of the purest, for the chil- 

 dren and calves from which it was procured had been 

 under medical observation. All that we had to take on 

 trust. In any case, there was no escape, and the fateful 

 moment had arrived. F. offered himself first, as an encour- 

 agement to the shrinking creatures around ; in another few 

 minutes the doctor would have begun and finished with 

 him. My turn would have come next, I suppose, then that 

 of the household servants, and so on, till the entire com- 

 poundful of people had been rendered immune from small- 

 pox at any rate, had not a totally unexpected interruption 

 now occurred. First a sound of galloping hoofs approaching 

 broke upon the ears of the assembled people, and in another 

 moment a couple of horsemen showed themselves tearing 

 up the hill, frantically waving papers in their right hands. 

 As they neared they were seen to be white with dust and 

 their faces livid and colourless, so hard had they ridden 

 in order to be in time to stop the vaccination ! Their errand 



