Page:Letters from India Vol 2.pdf/204

 to our great horror, the old khansamah came in wringing his hands and said the cooking boat had never arrived. That would be a joke at. home, even where there is only a village shop, but here it is a blow. All eatables are bought in the bazaar early, and cooked before the heat of the day begins, to preserve them, and after ten o'clock there is nothing to be bought. Our dinner was already cooked and coming up well packed; but there was not a morsel here. We found some sardines in a tin, and some wine, and a few hard biscuits, which we toasted, and there were some cruets, with which we varied the sauce to the sardines; and then Mars discovered a bottle of olives, and the khansamah at last borrowed a loaf, and it was a tolerable dinner for once, though rather salt. And just as we had finished the others arrived, the steamer having broken her paddle, and they had been obliged to land and borrow a carriage from Sir J. Grant. We comforted them with sardines and olives, and about an hour after we had all gone to bed the real dinner arrived. The old khansamah cried about it, and told Captain he had served seven Governors-General, and this was the first who had ever gone with-