Page:O Douglas - Olivia in India.djvu/178

166 answered for her: "Dod! Marget, I wouldna wonder but what ye micht hae been tempted by the Babylonish garment!"

They were very old when we knew them, these dear ladies, and they have been dead many years, but their simple, kindly lives have left a fragrance to sweeten this workaday world even as the mignonette in bygone summers scented their old-world garden.

How I do reminisce! It is entirely your fault for saying you liked it. You know it is a trait in the Douglas family. Our way of entertaining guests is to sit close together and recall happenings, and delightedly remind each other of childish escapades, shouting hilariously, while our guests sit in a bored and puzzled silence. Pleasant family the Douglases!

Well, as I said, Rika is a pleasant place and the Royles Irish, therefore charming. Mrs. Royle is a most purpose-like person. I like to go with her in the morning on her rounds. Through the gardens we go to see the bananas and pine-apples and tomatoes ripening in the sun, and make sure that the malis are doing their work; then on to the washhouse, where the dhobi is finishing the weekly wash; to the kitchens, to see that the cooking-pots are