All I had found out about them was, that Sir Charles Hyde was the name of the East Indian, and how he was a Bengal judge newly come home; where they lived, nobody at the ball seemed to know. At home, of course, it was so absurd to think of getting acquaintance with a rich Indian judge and his daughter, that I said no more of the matter; although I looked so foolish and care-about-nothing, I suppose, that my mother said to Jane she was sure I wanted to go to sea again, and even urged me to "take a trip to the Downs, perhaps." As for going to sea, however, I felt I could no more stir _then_, from where I was, than with a best-bower down, and all hands drunk but the captain. There was a favourite lazy spot of mine near the house, where I used to lie after dinner, and smoke amongst the grass, at the back of a high garden-wall with two doors in it, and a plank across a little brook running close under them. All round was a green paddock for cows; there was a tall tree at hand, which I climbed now and then half-mast high, to get a look down a long lane that ran level to the sky, and gave you a sharp gush of blue from the far end. Being a luxurious dog in those days, like the cloth in general when hung up ashore, I used to call it "The Idler's Walk," and "The Lazy Watch," where I did duty somewhat like the famous bo'sun that told his boy to call him every night and say the captain wanted him, when he turned over with a polite message, and no good to the old tyrant's eyes. Well, one afternoon I was stretched on the softest bit of this retreat, feeling unhappy all over, and trying to think of nothing particular, as I looked at the wall and smoked my cheroot. Excuse me if I think that, so far as I remember, there is nothing so consolatory, though it can't of course cure one, as a fine Manilla for the "green sickness," as our fore-mast fellows would say. My main idea was, that nothing on earth could turn up to get me out of this scrape, but I should stick eternally, with my head-sails shivering aback, or flapping in a sickening dead calm. It was a beautiful hot summer afternoon, as quiet as possible, and I was weary to death of seeing that shadow of the branch lying against the white wall, down to the keyhole of the nearest door. All of a sudden I heard the sweetest voice imaginable, coming down the garden as it were, singing a verse of a Hindostanee song I had heard the Bengal girls chant with their pitchers on their heads at the well, of an evening,-- "'La li ta la, ta perisi, La na comalay ah sahm-rè, Madna, ca--rahm Ram li ta, co-ca-la lir jhi! La li ta la, vanga-la ta perisi.'"