Page:Letters from India Vol 2.pdf/129



Simla, August 4, 1839.

I am writing to you entirely for my own amusement, not the least for yours. I’ve not the least notion when this will go; I have a great idea that there is something wrong in what we are pleased to call the dâk department. Probably all the letter-carriers have turned out to be Thugs. A sudden fit of bore came over me just now, when I considered how long my mind had been running on nothing but Indian trash, and so I am going to speak to you as a refreshment. It is a rainy day—not a common English sort of rainy day, but a rainy day in the rainy season. Something sublime and water-spouty about it; such eccentric white clouds about; one very thick one just walking bodily through the verandah into my room. In the valley the sun is shining through the rain, and in the extreme distance it is so clear I can see the Sutlej.

I have nothing of yours to answer since I wrote three weeks ago; but next week we expect the June letters, and I hope by that time