Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/77

63 India. Lifting the tat, (mat-screen,) we entered the central hall, and found ourselves in an airy room, with a lofty ceiling, in which the brown rafters were uncovered, but neatly painted. It was plainly furnished with chairs, tables, and sideboard. This is used as a dining, sitting, and receiving room; on each side of the hall are smaller apartments, used as sleeping-rooms and study. On the floor was a rattan mat, neat and cool, though rough; and over the table hung the Indian punkah, a swinging fan suspended from the ceiling. After our little six-feet square apartments on shipboard, it seemed a luxury indeed to have room enough to turn in, and to be able to raise our arms without fear of striking the ceiling over our heads; and, after tossing nineteen weeks upon the deep, doubly pleasant was it to be shown to a quiet chamber, with a little bath-room attached, to be all our own. And when we sat down at our table to send to anxious friends the news of our safe arrival, with a cup of tropical flowers before us; the margosa-tree, waving its branches without our venetian blinds; the loud cawing of crows, and the plaintive whistle of the Brahminee kite, coming to us from a cocoanut-tree hard by; the squirrels