Page:The Indian Civil Service as a profession.djvu/33

 tastes—for the scholar as well as for the sportsman. The Indian Empire is a vast ethnological and linguistic museum, stored with an infinite treasure of materials for the study of the science of man in all its branches. The history and antiquities of the country offer an illimitable field for investigation; and I can testify from personal experience that these subjects can furnish welcome relaxation from official toil and ample occupation for the long leisure of retirement. I would earnestly desire to impress on all young officers going to India the necessity—I am tempted to say the duty—of acquiring and keeping at least one hobby. In the long hours of a day in the hot weather, when the offices happen to be closed, and nothing disturbs the deadly silence of the darkened house, when tobacco