of Australian carriage horses, Walers as they are called in India. These were good-looking bays about fifteen-two, with plenty of substance and not badly bred. A Waler is not quite as good as the best English horse, but the breed is improving yearly; and a good Waler is not to be despised, either for saddle or harness. Then there was a pair of stud-bred chestnut geldings, better looking than the Walers but lighter, which Colonel Treveryan generally drove in a stanhope. Two more Walers filled up the six loose boxes in the main stable. These were real beauties,-Romulus and Remus, a brown and a bay, almost as handsome as English thoroughbreds. Both were well up to Colonel Treveryan's weight; and both would go perfectly straight at a charging boar, which is the best possible test of a horse's courage. Their master gave them many a chance of showing it, for he was a keen sportsman. In a smaller stable detached from the main building was Helen's horse, Sultan, a little gray Arab about fourteen-two. To Guy Langley and Dale he looked like a pony, with his compact frame and low round withers; but they could appreciate the clean short legs, and admire the beautiful blood head, with its broad jaw and forehead and intelligent eye. Like most good Arabs, Sultan seemed small in the stable, but stood double the size-another animal altogether when mounted and moving.

People write to The Field that Arabs cannot hold a candle to English horses. Of course they cannot if you put the two together on a racecourse, or to carry a heavy man over a grass country. You might as well expect a Brixham trawler to run before a summer breeze against a racing crack. But try both in a beat to windward against a south-west gale with a big Atlantic sea coming round the Lizard, and you will see. And try the Arab and the English horse on rough service, with scanty food and bad water and long marches, and you will see again.

Away in another stable by herself was Bess, who laid her ears back and snapped when they came to her. Colonel Treveryan admired her duly, and thereby won Dale's heart. Then they told Pooran to put her in the cart, and walked back to the house.

They found tea ready in the drawing-room, and Helen Treveryan ready to dispense it. She had looked beautiful before, but to Guy's eyes, and to Dale's, she looked still better now. She generally rode with her father in the evening, and she had dressed for her ride before coming out. Her habit was light gray, in deference to the climate; but it fitted her like a glove, and showed off to perfection the straight well-made figure. In those

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days women did not wear waistcoats and loose jackets, and ride with their elbows out. There was no dress in which a graceful woman looked so graceful as in her riding-habit. Helen Treveryan was essentially graceful, and the dress was exactly what she required. The shade of gray too was well suited to her light brown hair and clear skin; and with a round gray hat to match, and trim white cuffs and collar fastened by the plainest of little brooches, her whole get-up was thoroughly workmanlike.

A few minutes later, when Colonel Treveryan had finished his tea and changed his clothes, they all came out together on to the front steps. The two horses were standing on the gravel below. They looked up with a low whinny as they recognised Helen's voice, and she came down and petted them both, and made them each happy with a piece of sugar. Guy watched her with keen satisfaction, and asked if he could mount her. She hesitated for an instant, and looked round for Colonel Treveryan. 'Thank you,' she said; 'my father always mounts me;' and then fearing from the look on Guy's face that she had been ungracious, she added, 'But he has deserted me to-day. Would you really not mind helping me?' As she said it, Guy saw a sudden delicate flush come over her cheek and neck. It was still there as a little foot in its smart boot of yellow Russia leather was disengaged from his hand, and she settled herself in the saddle. Then Colonel Treveryan mounted, and the two rode away together, followed by their syces on foot, old Remus stepping off as quietly as if he were returning from a long march, his straight-cut tail swinging regularly at each step, while the Arab danced alongside as if his pasterns were made of indiarubber, his neck and long swish tail arched, trying to look as if he were fifteen hands high, and succeeding fairly well. His rider sat him perfectly, her figure erect but supple, and her hands in her lap.

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When the boys had got into their dog-cart and given the mare her head, there was a moment's pause, and then Guy said, 'By Jove, Chimp, what a jolly girl! and as handsome as paint.' And Chimp answered, Stunning; and about as nice as they make 'em in these parts.' And they drove back, enlarging upon the subject with all the poetical freedom which characterises the language of the British subaltern.

CHAPTER IX

AN INDIAN COLD WEATHER

You cannot talk of winter in the plains of India.

There is something dark and cold in the very sound of the word; and you cannot use it when week after week the sky over your head is a cloudless blue, and the flowers are in blossom. It is more like spring, and yet it is not spring. Englishmen in India call it simply the cold weather.'

The cold weather of 1876-77 had one distinctive feature. Early in the year Lord Lytton, Disraeli's Viceroy, had succeeded Lord Northbrook, and an active policy was in favour with the new Government. Before the rainy season came to an end and the sky cleared, it was known that there would soon be a grand gathering at Delhi, the old capital of the Moguls, and that the Queen would be proclaimed Empress of India. All over the country great preparations began to be made for the ceremony.

Moreover, rumours began to circulate as to the possibility of stirring events beyond the north-west frontier. It was said that Lord Lytton had come out determined to bring the Central Asian question' to a head. Russian aggression was to be faced in Afghanistan as well as in Turkey. The old policy of inaction was to be abandoned, and our relations with the Amir were to be put upon a proper footing. Those who could understand the signs of the times foresaw trouble; and the minds of men in India, Europeans and natives alike, were filled with a sense of coming excitement.

Nevertheless, in a quiet place like Syntia things went on very much as usual. The Thirtieth Lancers were not to form part of the army which the Viceroy proposed to assemble at Delhi; and though there was to be a durbar on the 1st of January, the younger members of the community were not

greatly concerned in these matters. To Guy Langley and Dale they promised a little more amusement, and this was all.

The cold weather being the drill season in India the Thirtieth had plenty of work. Colonel Aylmer was not a man to let them rust. The mornings were spent in parades or inspections, and no small portion of the rest of the day was also filled up. It is a mistake to suppose that a soldier in India has little or nothing to do. During the long summer months, no doubt, he has much time on his hands, but even then there is work to be done; and from the middle of October to the middle of April the military machine is in full swing. Still after all there is, as there should be, a considerable margin of leisure and pleasure in a soldier's life. You pay him next to nothing, and you expect him to die for you whenever called upon; it is only reasonable that he should have some compensations.

Colonel Aylmer was always ready to give his officers leave within reasonable limits, and he liked them to be sportsmen. Many a bright cloudless day Guy and Dale spent walking over the wet rice-fields, or wading through the jheels, in that most fascinating of occupations, snipe-shooting. They caught the knack before long, particularly Dale, who was the steadier shot of the two; and in the evening, when they had changed their wet clothes under a spreading peepul tree, and were in the cart again with the mare stepping out for home, they usually carried with them, for distribution among their friends, a goodly number of birds. Occasionally a bag of twenty or thirty couple of snipe was increased towards sunset by a dozen wild duck, shot at some favourite piece of water round which they would come wheeling again and again before giving up all hope of settling. All this means chills and fever at times; but the boys were young.

Sometimes they drove away in the early morning, after a hasty breakfast, so as to arrive by daybreak on the edge of the grain-fields, where the antelope came from the great grass plains to feed on the growing crops. Often enough this ended in disappointment. A watchful doe gave the alarm, and there was a hasty useless shot or two at a hundred and fifty yards, as the beautiful beast they had been stalking went away in tremendous bounds over the long grass before settling down to his gallop. At times, however, they were rewarded. As they lay in some dry water-hole or thick patch of cover, the young buck came quietly within reach of them, unsuspicious of evil, his brown

back and yellowish belly showing clearly against the morning sky; or some veteran of many summers, almost coal-black above and white below, his long slender spiral horns lying along his back, gradually approached them, stalking slowly forward alone, or playing with his brown does. Then there was a sudden report from Guy's rifle, or the little ·360 express, with a bullet like a bit of pencil, which Dale used for buck-shooting; and as the smoke cleared away, they saw the does scattering through the grass, and a dark shape on the ground struggling vainly to get up; and the native shikaris ran in and cut the poor beast's throat, to make it lawful food-halál.

Then the pig-sticking; the drive out in the evening to a camp under the trees; and the merry camp dinner; and the long sweet sleep in an airy tent; and the mountain in the morning light; and the wait at the edge of the jungle, spear in hand, while the sound of the beat came nearer and nearer; and the sudden sight of the great gray boar, galloping out defiantly, straight before him; and the mad pursuit over broken ground, and the fierce swerve and charge, and the thrill of the spear as the point went home, and the long savage fight, and the dogged, pitiful, gallant death. Lee managed the pig-sticking. He knew the country thoroughly, he was always well mounted, and he rode as if he had no neck. He soon taught Guy and Dale to understand the game; and such a game. There is no sport on earth, not one, like a fight with a fighting boar.

Apart from sport, there was always something to do in the cool clear evenings. Polo had not then been worked out to a science, but it already had taken strong root in India, and directly the Thirtieth had got some ponies together they began playing twice a week. Most of the Civil officers were away in camp, but all the ladies used to assemble to watch the game; and it was very bright and sociable. At first the Thirtieth played extremely badly, and did their best to kill themselves and each other, but they improved fast, which was more than the ground did. A few weeks after the rains ceased it was as hard as iron; and the clatter of the ponies' hoofs sounded as if they were galloping on pavement. A fall then was no joke; but when one is young nothing matters.

When there was no polo, there was tennis and Badminton at the Colonel's, or the Commissioner's, if the Commissioner was in the Station; or a 'lady's evening' at the racket-court among the mango trees. There was a very fair racket-court at Syntia. It