AEEIVAL IN INDIA 233 
the representative of Botany in Ceylon. Science was likely 
to benefit by official acquaintance with men of science. 
Madras revealed the splendours of Oriental pageantry in 
the official reception of the Governor- General. The military 
display, the brilliant colour of the crowds who poured out of 
the city, amply compensated for the waste of half a day on 
board ship while arrangements were being completed ashore. 
This was India itself ; authentic information was to be 
gleaned, practical arrangements made for forthcoming travel. 
An old acquaintance turned up in Major Garsten, bluff and 
burly, whom he remembered as a threadpaper of a lad in 
Edinburgh. He heard tall stories of the Mysore summer ; when 
wineglasses snap off at the stem, untouched, and tables of teak 
split across the grain. Through Gideon Thomson, the brother 
of his Glasgov/ friend, he had hopes of securing a good plant 
collector. Five servants were needed for his travels, besides 
collectors ; and Madras servants were reputed better and more 
faithful than Bengahs. More lessons in Hindustani were re- 
quired ; ' my progress in the lingo,' he laments, ' is very slow. 
I have no head for languages, especially such a cacophonous 
one as this.' He spent most of his time in the Horticultural 
Society Gardens, and seeing Mr. ElHott's collections of birds and 
animals. But even so, when he began travelling in Bengal he 
found the plants, presumably common Bengal species, new to 
him, ' and without books I cannot give even the generic names, 
so ignorant do I find myself.' 
In Calcutta, where he arrived on January 12, he first 
stayed with an old friend of his father. Sir Lawrence Peel ; ^ 
afterwards at Government House, for 
neither the Governor- General nor Lady Dalhousie wiU allow 
me to take up my quarters anywhere but with them. [And 
a little later] : Both show great friendship to me. He 
is a very fine fellow, who always means what he says ; and 
1 Sir Lawrence Peel (1799-1884) was a cousin of the statesman. Sir Robert. 
He was knighted in 1842 when promoted from. Advocate-General to Chief Justice 
of the Supreme Court at Calcutta. Eeturning to England in 1855, he became 
Indian Assessor to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The love of his 
beautiful place at Calcutta was recorded in the name of his house at Ventnor, 
Garden Reach. 
