Ootacamund and Anglo-Indian Life 331 



trees or bushes, but green downs on each side. Ten 

 miles drive, with the air getting damper and colder 

 every mile, mists and clouds occasionally enveloping 

 us, constant scuds of rain sweeping along on the breeze, 

 and we dropped down upon the hill station, bar none, 

 in all India sheltered and wooded Ootacamund. 



44 Dear old Ooty " is quite up on the tops of the 

 Nilgiris, in the centre of a plateau many hundreds of 

 square miles in size, where a pack of hounds may be 

 kept, where one can go out on long shooting ex- 

 peditions into the wildest of jungle, and where one 

 might gallop on for hours on end over sound turf, 

 or picnic at some fresh place every day in the 

 week. 



Ooty nestles picturesquely round a calm, shining 

 lake, among the slopes of a country like the Sussex 

 Downs ; till a sharp-peaked mountain in the distance 

 recalls the Highlands. 'Try to believe you are in India. 

 It is difficult. The cold, bracing air sweeps over the 

 charming landscape of downs and woods, and you 

 feel it is very good to be up in this cloudland, seven 

 thousand feet above the sweltering plains. 



We drove to Woodside. Each bungalow in Ooty 

 seemed to lie in a hill of its own, distinctly private, its 

 own green tennis lawns, its own pine and eucalyptus 

 groves, its marvellous flowers. Every ditch and 

 marshy spot was filled with rank clumps of arum 

 lilies, thrusting their great, snowy flowers up to the 

 heavens ; the very hedges were made of scarlet 

 geraniums and of heliotrope ; the whole of Ooty smelt 



