Though I had my house to myself, and was not liable to be intruded upon at all hours of the day by the Page boys and Chamberlains, there were, nevertheless, I found, certain bodily discomforts and inconveniences to undergo, arising chiefly from the intense cold. Owing to the numerous doors and windows in the house, there was not a room that we could keep the bitter wind out of. I had been called to the Palace in the early winter, and had only a small stock of wood in my house. This was soon gone, and now wood was scarce and hard to get, for the Royal workshops had the first claim. The only way, therefore, to keep warm was to sit crouched on the floor close up to the charcoal sandali, and draw the quilt up to one’s chin, wearing, at the same time, postîn, overcoat, and hat. After several hours this becomes monotonous. In order to hold a book and read, or at meal times to use one’s knife and fork, it was necessary to protect the hands with thick woollen gloves. One day, in February, the weather struck me as being warmer than usual, and I found the temperature in my sitting-room had gone up to 20 degrees Fahr. This was not so bad, and my thermometer would register it; but when it was really cold, I was not able to find what the temperature was, for the mercury shrank into the bulb. At dinner time it is exceedingly inconvenient to find you can neither break nor cut your bread: and to be obliged to break up your drinking water with a hammer is irritating. There is, I have heard, a large trade in frozen meat between England and New Zealand, and in this country I have eaten the erstwhile frozen sheep with great enjoyment. In Kabul it was not so. The joint came smoking from the fire, brought in over a pan of charcoal, but the centre, near the bone, was icy and raw: this was not nice. Frozen pickles are useless: and the same may be said of frozen ink: my letters, therefore, were written in pencil. Why the damson jam should not have advanced beyond the glutinous stage of freezing, I do not know, but it never froze solid. This worried me at the time: there seemed something unnatural about it. I dislike being hurried, and to be obliged to drink my morning cup of cocoa at once to prevent it freezing, almost made me regret my rooms at the Palace--Pages, atmosphere of intrigue and all: but I overcame this weakness. Going to bed was a function; and I dressed carefully for the purpose. Over the woollens came a tennis coat and a sheepskin waistcoat; there were two pairs of wool socks, a dressing-gown, a pair of gloves, and a hat. The cotton wool mattress was laid on the earth-beaten floor: it was warmer than a charpoy--but harder. A buffalo rug, a fox-skin rug, and a quilt finished the arrangements. One of the soldiers of the guard had to come and put my candle out when the performance was over.