Page:The life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (IA b21778401).pdf/98

68 years of hard study before I could walk into a bazar and distinguish the several castes, and know something of them, their manners and customs, religion and superstitions. I at once engaged a venerable Parsee, Dosabhai Sohrabji, also a mubid, or priest, as his white cap and coat showed, who had coached many generations of griffs, and under his guidance dived deep into the "Ethics of Hind" (Akhlak-i-Hindi) and other such text-books.

This was the year after the heir-apparent was born; when Nott, Pollock, and Sale revenged the destruction of some 13,000 men by the Afghans; when the Chinese War broke out; when Lord Ellenborough succeeded awkward Lord Auckland; and when Major-General Sir Charles J. Napier, commanding at Poonah, was appointed to Sind (August 25th, 1842), and when his subsequent unfriend, Brevet-Major James Outram, was on furlough to England; lastly, and curious to say, most important of all to me, was the fact that "Ensign Burton" was ranked and posted in the G. G. O. of October 15th, 1842, to the 18th Regiment, Bombay N.I.

Nor was I less surprised by the boasting of my brother officers (the Sepoys had thrashed the French in India and elsewhere, they were the flower of the British army, and so forth)—fine specimen of esprit de corps run mad, which was destined presently to change its tone, after 1857. Meanwhile this loud brag covered an ugly truth. We officers of the Indian army held her Majesty's commission, but the Company's officers were looked upon by the Queen's troops as mere auxiliaries, locals without general rank, as it were black policemen. Moreover the rules of the service did not allow us to rise above a certain rank. What a contrast to the French private, who carries a Marshal's baton in his knapsack!

Captain Cleland introduced me to his sister, the wife of a field-officer, and she to sundry of her friends, whose tone somewhat surprised me. Here and there a reference was made to my "immortal soul," and I was overwhelmed with oral treatises upon what was expected from a "Christian in a heathen land." And these ladies "talked shop," at least, so it appeared to me, like non-commissioned officers. After Shikar and the linguistics, the only popular pursuit in India is (I should think always was) "Society." But indigestible dinners are not pleasant in a Turkish bath; dancing is at a discount in a region of eternal dog-days; picnics are unpleasant on the "palm-tasselled strand of glowing Ind," where scorpions and cobras come uninvited; horse-racing, like Cicero's "Mercaturi," to be honoured, must be on a large scale; the Mess tiffin is an abomination ruinous to digestion and health; the billiard-table my pass an hour or so pleasantly enough, but it becomes a