224 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



fellow, but he may have been only bored, and certainly we 

 were in no position to judge. His august father, who was 

 not half so fine as he, was evidently proud of him. 



The Nizam's palace was a wonderful place, and the 

 strange contrasts to be seen everywhere were simply ludi- 

 crous. Marble floors and shocking mirrors ; exquisite fur- 

 niture and the crudest of pictures ; ceilings decorated with 

 dozens of large green and red glass globes, hanging singly 

 as though they were art treasures — the kind only meant 

 for Christmas trees, except that these were as large as foot- 

 balls, very likely made especially for the Nizam. One room 

 was furnished entirely in glass, the tables, chairs, sofas, 

 and footstools all running on gilded castors on a glass floor, 

 and all quite solid-looking but uninviting. They had been 

 made for His Royal Highness in Vienna, and though we 

 were far from admiring the idea, we could say truthfully 

 that it was very wonderful. 



Another vast apartment was fitted up with nothing but 

 ivory and malachite, great slabs of the latter forming the 

 tops of tables ; and here the contrast was lovely. 



Seeing ivory used in this lavish way made one think re- 

 gretfully of the awful slaughter involved in obtaining 

 such quantities ; but the Eastern magnate counts the cost 

 of nothing — certainly not that sort of cost — giving not a 

 thought to it ; for that matter, he thinks and does very 

 little for himself at all. 



There was no end to the rooms in this huge palace, and 

 no comfort in any of them, to our thinking. One was 

 severely destitute of any furniture whatever, apparently 

 the better to display the beauty of its walls, which were of 

 rich, glossy vermilion — charming enough but for the cheap 

 crockery stuck all over them. Nor was there any fear of 

 these treasures falling, every piece being embedded into 

 the surface — cups, saucers, plates, and dishes of the kind 

 seen on costers' barrows in England. 



