The result was, that after about a fortnight Her Highness refused European medical treatment. So far from worrying me, this was an absolute relief to my mind; for the position was not without its dangers. A week after this came Christmas day. I gave instructions to the Chief Cook, and then invited Messrs. Stewart and Myddleton to dine with me in my rooms at the Palace. It was a clear sunny day; bitterly cold, with a hard frost. My guests arrived on horseback about six p.m., their servants bringing knives, forks, and plates, cigars, and a bottle of whisky. I hadn’t such a thing as whisky, but I produced with great pride a quart bottle of champagne that I had found in the medical stores, and which I had the Amîr’s permission to use. We sat down to dinner. My brass candelabra, each with three candles, lit up the festive board: a wood fire blazing on the hearth threw a warm glow over the room: the white walls cast back the light; and the cosy room, with crimson curtains drawn over door and windows, made us almost forget Afghanistan, and we lost, if only for a time, the feeling of insecurity in which we were living. We had soup, tinned salmon, partridges, roast mutton, anchovy toast, plum pudding all blazing, and fruit. Then came the champagne. With subdued but proud excitement we cut the wire and waited for the cork to pop--it did not pop. We eased it a little with our thumb, and waited. We patted the bottle gently; then shook it--and still waited. The Armenian, standing by, smiled. “You might bring a corkscrew,” I said, carelessly; “the cork is evidently hard.” He produced a corkscrew with suspicious readiness, and I proceeded to carefully insert it. Oh, yes, the cork came out easily enough. It was not the fault of the cork. But the champagne!--Did you ever taste champagne that hadn’t any fizz in it? It is beastly. “What’s wrong with it?” I asked the Armenian, when he had tasted it. “No-thing, Sir!” he said. “He in Hospital ’leven years, all his strength gone away.” We “passed” the champagne; whisky was good enough for us. I told the Armenian that it was only blue-blooded Dukes like himself who could drink flat champagne. “Sir, he is not flat; very good sherbet he is; I like him.” But after he had been to England he wouldn’t drink champagne that had been eleven years in the Hospital. After dinner Myddleton sang with great taste, and in a sweet tenor voice, some old English ballads--“The Thorn,” “The Anchor’s Weighed,” and a Christmas carol; Stewart occasionally putting in a seconds. I enjoyed it immensely: it was such a treat to hear music again. I did not sing myself, for some of my servants were Afghans and they were in the room: I should have lowered myself in their eyes if I had sung; my guests, however, were indifferent to the opinion of the Afghans. About midnight they departed, and rode back, escorted by a couple of soldiers, to their rooms at the workshops. [Sidenote: The Amîr’s Fainting Attack.]