a little cost and care. The farm or cottage to which they apparently belonged, was a mere hut of bamboos and thatch, but very clean, and its sheds and granary, which enclosed as usual a small court, larger and cleaner externally than is usually seen near Calcutta, which neighbourhood certainly loses ground, in my opinion, the more I see of the rest of Bengal. After crossing this formidable current close to the mouth of the strait, which we had before vainly endeavoured to stem, with great difficulty, we came to a miserable drowned country, without habitations, a great deal of it jungle, and the rice with which the rest was cultivated, looking starved and yellow with its over supply of water. If the river rose at all higher, the crop I was told would be good for nothing, and that it was now almost spoiled. It was a different kind of rice from that grown near Dacca, and required to be reaped tolerably dry. The water-rice is of an inferior quality. Along this wretched coast it would be almost impossible for the men to tow, and therefore having a good breeze, I determined to run on till we should get to sound land again. By the light of a fine moon we held on our course till nearly nine o'clock, when hearing the cigalos chirp on shore, which I knew was no bad sign, I told the Serang he might lugao." He did so with great joy, and we found fine dry fields of cotton and silk-mulberries, with a grassy bank to the river's edge, and a broad sandy path leading to a village at a little distance. "Now then Mohammed," I said with some triumph, as I had had great difficulty in making him go on so

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244

BUNIYAN'S SHOP.

far, "and all you dandees, is not a night's sail better than a day's tracking ?" "Yes, my Lord," was the answer of one of the men, "but toil is better than peril, and the eye of the day than the blindness of the night." It was plain that they were all afraid of getting aground, not knowing this part of the river, but in so fine a night, and with due care, I could not think the danger at all probable.

I walked to the village with Abdullah to get some milk, and to see the place. The soil was light, but apparently good, and we passed through crops of cotton, millet, and barley. We found a large herd of draught buffaloes, tethered two and two, but no milk-giving animal of any kind. The herdsman referred us to a cottage, whence came out an old woman to say that her cows were gone to another place at some distance; that the only people at all likely to supply us, were the "Giriftu," tacksmen, or chief tenants of the village, and a "Buniyan," or trader, whose shop we should find a little further. We went along a lane till we came to a large and clean-looking hut, with a small shed adjoining, where, with a lamp over his head, and a small heap of cowries, some comfits, elicampane, rice, ghee, and other grocery matters before him, sat the buniyan of the place, a shrewd, sharp, angular old man in spectacles, being the first naked man I ever saw so decorated. On Abdullah's stating our wants, he laughed, and said that neither he, nor, to his knowledge, the giriftu, had either cow or goat. "The land here," he said, " is never

EVENING WALK IN BENGAL.

245

quite overflowed; it is therefore too good for pasture, and we never let our cows look at it till after harvest." "But," said Abdullah, "the Sahib will

give a good price for it." "Whether you give or no," said the old man testily, "it does not matter, unless you choose to milk the cat!" Thus ended our search, from which I learnt two things: how to account for the large herds of cattle which we saw in the sandy and less valuable district behind -and that Hindoostanee here, and not Bengalee, begins to be the common speech of the peasantry, since the old woman and this man both spoke it and conversed in it with each other.

us,

The boats had in the meantime arrived, so that milk was not wanted; but the evening was so fine that I continued to walk up and down, till Abdullah besought me not to take so much exercise, saying it was that which had turned my hair so grey since my arrival in India.

246

EVENING WALK IN BENGAL.

Nor (taught by recent harm to shun
The thunders of the English gun,)
A dreadful guest but rarely seen,
Returns to scare the village green.
Come boldly on! no venom'd snake
Can shelter in so cool a brake.
Child of the sun! he loves to lie
'Midst Nature's embers, parch'd and dry,
Where o'er some tower in ruin laid,
The peepul spreads its haunted shade;
Or round a tomb his scales to wreathe,
Fit warder in the gate of Death !
Come on! Yet pause! behold us now
Beneath the bamboo's arched bough,
Where, gemming oft that sacred gloom,
Glows the geranium's scarlet bloom',
And winds our path through many a bower
Of fragrant tree and giant flower;
The ceiba's crimson pomp display'd
O'er the broad plaintain's humbler shade,
And dusk anana's prickly blade;
While o'er the brake, so wild and fair,
The betel waves his crest in air.
With pendant train and rushing wings,
Aloft the gorgeous peacock springs;
And he, the bird of hundred dyes,
Whose plumes the dames of Ava prize.
So rich a shade, so green a sod,
Our English fairies never trod !

Yet who in Indian bow'r has stood,

}

But thought on England's "good green wood?"
And bless'd, beneath the palmy shade,

Her hazel and her hawthorn glade,

And breath'd a pray'r, (how oft in vain!)

To gaze upon her oaks again?

A truce to thought! the jackall's cry

Resounds like sylvan revelry;

And through the trees, yon failing ray

Will scantly serve to guide our way.

'A shrub whose deep scarlet flowers very much resemble the geranium, and thence called the Indian geranium.-ED.

EVENING WALK IN BENGAL.

Yet mark! as fade the upper skies,
Each thicket opes ten thousand eyes.
Before, beside us, and above,
The fire-fly lights his lamp of love,
Retreating, chacing, sinking, soaring,
The darkness of the copse exploring ;
While to this cooler air confest,
The broad Dhatura bares her breast,
Of fragrant scent and virgin white,
A pearl around the locks of night!
Still as we passed in softened hum,
Along the breezy alleys come
The village song, the horn, the drum.
Still as we pass, from bush and briar,
The shrill cigala strikes his lyre;
And, what is she whose liquid strain
Thrills through yon copse of sugar-cane?
I know that soul-entrancing swell!

It is it must be-Philomel!

Enough, enough, the rustling trees
Announce a shower upon the breeze,―
The flashes of the summer sky
Assume a deeper, ruddier dye;
Yon lamp that trembles on the stream,
From forth our cabin sheds its beam;
And we must early sleep, to find
Betimes the morning's healthy wind.
But oh! with thankful hearts confess
Ev'n here there may be happiness;
And He, the bounteous Sire, has given
His peace on earth-his hope of heaven!

247

I wrote this endeavouring to fancy that I was not alone. I believe only one note is necessary. The bird of" hundred dyes" is the mucharunga,

66

many coloured." I am not sure whether I mentioned the fact before, but I learned at Dacca, that while we were at peace with the Burmans, many traders used to go over all the eastern provinces of Bengal, buying up these beautiful birds for the