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162 happiness, and every day I like the place and the people more.

Rika was rather a revelation. The civilians' bungalows have a here-we-have-no-continuing-city look about them; their owners are constantly being moved, and pitching their moving tents elsewhere; but the Royles have been at Rika for fifteen years, and have made a delightful home. The bungalow is built on a slightly rising ground with a verandah all round—a verandah made pleasant with comfortable chairs, rugs, writing-tables, books, and flowers. At one end a dirzee squats with a sewing-machine, surrounded by white stuff in various stages of progress for the Mem Sahib and the children. From the middle of the verandah a broad flight of steps, flanked on either side by growing plants in pots, leads down to the road, and across the road lie the tennis-lawns and the flower-garden. I have read that one of the most pathetic things about this Land of Exile is the useless effort to make English flowers grow. In Rika they must feel at home, for the whole air is scented with roses and mignonette. When Mrs. Royle took us to see her flowers, Boggley pulled a sprig of mignonette, sniffed it appreciatively, and handing it to me said:

"What does that remind you of?"