In India there is no difficulty in housing oneself. No important agents are necessary, and advertising is scarcely known. Accordingly, without ceremony, we took quiet possession of the first vacant bungalow which we came to, and our fifteen domestics did not seem to question for a moment the propriety of the occupation. Under our somewhat despotic government, are not the sahib loeg[18] above petty social observances? While A. was busily employed getting his guns ready and preparing for shikari in the adjacent forest and jungles, which swarm with peafowl, partridges, quail, pigeons, and a variety of other game, my first care was to summon the resident mali (gardener), and ascertain how the beautiful and extensive garden of which we had taken possession[19] might be further stocked. "Mem sahib,"[20] said the quiet old gardener, with his hands in a supplicatory position, "there is abundance here of everything--aloo, lal sag, anjir, padina, baingan, piyaz, khira, shalgham, kobs, ajmud, kharbuza, amb, amrut, anar, narangi--"[21] "Stay!" I interrupted; "that is enough." But the old mali had something more to add: "Mem sahib, all is your own, and your slave shall daily bring his customary offering, and flowers for the table; and the protector of the poor will not refuse bakshees for the bearer." I promised to be liberal to the poor old man, and then proceeded to inspect the flower-garden. Here I was surprised to find a perfect fraternisation between the tropical flora and our own. Amongst flowers not unfamiliar to the European were abundance of the finest roses, superb crimson and gold poincianas, the elegant hybiscus, graceful ipomoeas, and convolvuli of every hue, the purple amaranth, the variegated double balsam, the richest marigolds, the pale-blue clusters of the plantago, acacias, jasmines, oranges, and pomegranates, intermixed with our own pansies, carnations, cinerarias, geraniums, fuchsias, and a wealth of blossoms impossible to remember by name. "If there is a paradise on earth, it is this, it is this!" Far more beautiful to the homely eye are such gardens than those of Shalimar and Pinjore, with their costly marble terraces, geometrical walks, fountains and cascades falling over sculptured slabs. Nor are we in India confined to the enjoyment of Nature. Art[22] finds its way to us from Europe, and literature here receives the warmest welcome. Our pianos, our musical-boxes--our costly and richly bound illustrated works, fresh from England--the most thrilling romances of fiction, and all the periodicals of the day, are regularly accumulated in these charming Indian retreats, and keep up the culture of the mind in a valley whose "glorious beauty" is, as I have said, no "fading flower," but the home of the missionary, and the resort of the war-worn soldier or truth-loving artist.