"Well, this is a pretty state of things, when you find a native in a cabin!" said a young military officer to me, when he saw an Indian go into the adjoining cabin on board ship. "If he has paid for his berth, he has a right to it," I said; "besides, he is not in your cabin." "Well I did think that a P. & O. was a white man's ship," replied the young officer with great bitterness. "No doubt you missionaries have learnt to get over the prejudice," said a delightful young army captain to me on board the same ship, "and I suppose it is very wrong of me; but I positively _hate_ a black man." Though there are certain drawbacks connected with some native passengers, they are much more courteous than the average Englishman is, even to his own countrymen. The stranger, who at some wayside station, intrudes into a carriage already sufficiently full, does not expect to be welcomed. At night the large clerical sun hat meets with a specially cold reception from the Englishman, who peeps out at the intruder from beneath his blankets. But the Indian traveller will assure you that there is plenty of room. He will cheerfully help you with your luggage, clearing away his own belongings in order to make space for yours; and on one occasion an Indian insisted on my taking his berth, while he himself sat up on a corner of a seat for the rest of the night. However good the intentions of kindly Englishmen may be when travelling, it is almost impossible to avoid the appearance of acquiescing in arrangements which are trying to the Indian. On most lines there are third-class compartments reserved for Europeans and Eurasians. The arrangement is not merely to protect the Englishman from the intrusion of native fellow-passengers. The Hindu is at least equally unwilling to have the white man as an intruder in his own part of the train, and it is generally understood that just as the native must not trespass into the European compartments, so on his part the Englishman should keep out of the carriages allotted to Indians. Not being able to find the usual European compartment on a certain train, I asked the young Eurasian ticket-collector whereabouts it was. "There is not one on the train," he said, "but I will soon make one." And going to one of the native compartments, already fairly filled with people, he said rudely and roughly: "Here, I say, you have all got to clear out of that." The Eurasian is inclined to imitate what he thinks to be correct English style, by talking in a blustering way to those whom he contemptuously styles "natives." The Indians, slowly and unwillingly, but silently, transferred themselves and their many belongings to another carriage, and then they saw three members of the ruling race take their places in a carriage seated for twenty-eight. CHAPTER XXXIV CUSTOMS OF EAST AND WEST