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 annoys an Englishman more than to find anybody who can say cleverer things than he can himself. If you want to impress an Englishman, be dull and respectable, and don't show that you are clever or light-hearted whatever you do. Though there's an epigram or something real witty on the tip of your tongue, hold on, and don't let go. If you do you're bound to become an object of suspicion straight away in the average Englishman's mind, and days of dull respectability won't quite wipe out that first fatal suspicion. So I was just as dull and solemn before those dear old ladies as I could possibly be. I didn't even laugh when they told me they had brought out enough water in casks to last them all the time they were in India, because they had heard that the water out there was always full of microbes.

'We're so afraid of cholera,' said one.

'And enteric,' said another.

'And hermataphrosis,' said the third.

'Great heavens!' I exclaimed. 'What's that?' The third old lady positively blushed. 'It's very dreadful,' she murmured, in such a shy way that I felt it would be positively indecent to pursue the subject further. 'You are carrying enough drinking water along with you to last the whole trip!' I said in amazement. If my eyes had grown bulgy at the doings of these old ladies there might have been some excuse.

'Yes, and most of our food as well,' said the one who was called Martha.