435 



You must pardon me for transgressing j r our commands respecting 

 the perusal of the early part of your correspondence. I confess I 

 wished to know your juvenile sentiments, as well as to behold the 

 juvenile efforts of your pencil ; and without flattery (to which you 

 well know I am not addicted) I may venture to say they need no 

 apology : but I am of opinion that both by your descriptions and 

 drawings, you have so beautified this side of India that I hardly 

 know it again. And now, surprised into a belief that these things 

 are really so, I only wonder I did not find it before. The fact 

 perhaps may be, that I have wanted observation ; or, as Lord 

 Chesterfield says, " I have looked without seeing." I believe 

 however that you have licence, in the double capacity of poet and 

 painter." 



Had Bombay retained all its former hospitality and urbanity, 

 the influx of so large a proportion of civil servants from the northern 

 settlements in Guzerat, without employment or suitable mainte- 

 nance, was a very unpleasant reflection. The military, as already 

 noticed, were ordered to other garrisons, and suffered no pecuniary 

 hardship. It was very different with the civilians; to them the 

 Presidency offered neither pleasure, profit, nor usefulness; nor was 

 there any provision for them at the southern subordinates. Our 

 hopes in India being thus extinguished, we looked forwards to 

 England ; where, withdrawn from the fatigue and anxiety of 

 camps and senates, from pageantry and ostentation, into the 

 bosom of family and domestic comforts, we might pass the re- 

 mainder of our days in rural tranquillity, enjoying the supreme de- 

 lights of a peaceful mind, and a conscience void of offence. 



