Without further delving into the abysmal and prolific mine of our misdoings and shortcomings, I think I have succeeded in directing the reader’s attention to the subject of the treatment of our young ones that we are compelled to leave to the tender mercies of relations, friends, and strangers. Children from the East require even greater care than those born at home; and there ought therefore to be some safeguard, some compulsory registration and reliable inspection. My own experience may perhaps be an exceptional one—I hope and trust that it is so—but if such things can be done in the green tree, what may not occur in the dry! It is time we bestirred ourselves to legislate, for something is rotten in the state of Denmark! CHAPTER XIV. “LEAVE OF ABSENCE.” “There is a divinity that shapes our ends, Rough hew them how we will.” The selection of the route narrowed itself to that of “Hobson’s choice”; for the embers of the Mutiny were still smouldering in various quarters, where the roads were consequently unsafe. I was therefore compelled to reach the sea by river, and was the more ready to adopt this course as an old friend and his wife were going as far as Moulmein. My antipathy to the country was by this time as deep-rooted as the lilac crocus in autumn, and has never since relaxed its hold. I felt I must leave it at any cost, while the thought of ever returning weighed upon me like a day- and night-mare. The India of the past was irretrievably blotted out by the Mutiny; henceforth no dependence could be placed on anything; there was no safe anchorage, all was adrift. The pack was always being shuffled; pay, rank, nomenclature, uniform and precedence were distributed _seriatim_, each deal being declared a false one. Of that huge pudding, made up of England’s possessions, our Indian Empire certainly contains some of the plums; and young men are naturally not backward at competing for them. What is to be the end of all this feverish competition I do not care to think, for these are congested days, and, for want of a comprehensive scheme of emigration, we at home are striving to make a pint hold a quart. With extended emigration, smaller holdings at home, and a tariff more equitable to our own producers and less so to foreigners, something might possibly be done to allay the sufferings of mankind. It was refreshing to hear the sound of the paddle-wheels, and to find ourselves moving rapidly with the Gangetic stream, which was, as usual, flowing swiftly past before the end of the monsoon. We needed this help, for there were several hundred miles between us and the sea, which we could traverse only by day. Pleasant as was the sensation of leaving the country, we were not a merry party by any means; some were leaving behind those who had been very dear to them, while others were hard and fast in the dread clutches of disease; and the prospects of nearly all were utterly ruined.