Page:The Autobiography of an Indian Princess.djvu/40

26 that once a fine idea struck him. "Let's make soap," he said; "everybody uses soap, and there is a lot of money in it. Sunity, we will become very rich." My youngest uncle (my mother's brother) was asked to be a partner in the scheme, and we collected quantities of lime, oil, and essences wherewith we thought to produce the ideal cleanser. These we heaped anyhow into a frying-pan and began to heat them up. But to our dismay we found something was wrong. The smoke and flames nearly blinded us, and we were forced to retreat and let the horrid mess burn itself out.

Coolootola was our playground, and I think if the walls could have spoken to us they might have related some very strange stories of the old doings at " Sen's House." I always felt the rooms had histories, and I remember a certain staircase which report said was haunted, and which was the scene of two uncanny happenings when I was a child. Once when my cousins were playing hide-and-seek, one of them seemed to be held back by some unseen force as he ran down the staircase. When at last he managed to shake off the terror which possessed him, he fainted.

I was equally frightened at the same place, but in a different way. My father always cooked his own breakfast, and it was a great privilege to me in my holidays to be allowed to help him. One day he had finished his breakfast, and I was bringing