154 EVERYDAY LIFE ON A 



CHAPTER XI 



August 25. — Since I last wrote in my Journal, 

 much that was unexpected has happened. In 

 the first place we have been moved from Ranee- 

 totem to an Estate some miles nearer Kandy. 

 Rob's lingering malarial attack pointed out 

 only too surely that he had remained already 

 too long in that exhausting climate, so his 

 employers ordered an exchange of billets. In 

 consequence we find ourselves in a charming 

 bungalow in a much better climate, with refresh- 

 ingly cool mornings and evenings, with near 

 neighbours, bicycling roads, and even a 

 good tennis court. It is rather humiliating 

 to find the effect a good house has on 

 one's sensations. When I sit writing here 

 in my pretty little drawing-room, surrounded by 

 photographs of my dear ones at home, and look 

 across a broad white pillared verandah on to a 

 rose garden in which my old friends, Gloire de 

 Dijon, Triomphe de Rennes, Marshal Niel, 

 Baroness Rothschild, Captain Christy, Fellen- 



