Page:O Douglas - Olivia in India.djvu/84

72 unnoticed in the murkier atmosphere of England. The wonder to me is that anyone keeps nice when one thinks of the provocation there is to deteriorate. The climate, the lack of any serious occupation to take up their days, the constant round of gaieties indulged in partly, I believe, to keep themselves from thinking, the ever-present anxiety about the children at home—oh! there is much one could say if one held a brief for the Anglo-Indian women.

Calcutta society is made up of Government people, Army people, and business people who are called, for some unknown reason, box-wallahs. It seems very strange that there should be such a desire to go one better than one's neighbour, to have better horses, a smarter carrriagecarriage [sic], a larger house, smarter gowns, because, at least in the case of the Civil Service people, their income is known down to the last rupee.

Everybody in India is, more or less, somebody. It must be a very sad change to go home to England and be (comparatively) poor and shabby, and certainly obscure, to have people remark vaguely they suppose you are "something in India." I suppose we are all snobs at heart. Snobbery, sir, doth walk about the orb like the sun, it shines everywhere. A good lady talked to me quite