I don't like things that cost
a lot; simple little pleasures please me much more. To drive out to
Tollygunge of an afternoon, have tea and a game of croquet, look at
the picture papers, and come quietly home again, is to me the height
of bliss.
Tollygunge is a club, some miles out of Calcutta, with a race-course,
golf-links, croquet-lawns--a very delectable spot. The correct thing
is to drive out on Sunday morning and have breakfast out in the open
air. Then one sees everyone one knows, and it is very gay; but I think
it is much pleasanter to drive out quietly in the afternoon.
The road to Tollygunge lies partly through the jungle, past clusters
of native huts where little chocolate-coloured babies roll and chatter
in the sunlit dust. You know, the jungle is quite near Calcutta.
When I lie at nights and listen to the jackals howling, I remember
Kipling's story, and wonder if we were driven out and the jungle were
let in, how long it would be before Calcutta became a habitation for
the beasts of the field.
Yesterday I drove out with Mrs. Townley and G., and three tired people
we were, too tired even to play the gentle game of croquet; glad to
sit still in comfortable chairs on the greensward and steep ourselves
in the peace and quietness.
At tea, Chil the kite, hovering in mid-air, watched us jealously.
Suddenly there was a swoop, a dark flutter of wings, a startled squeak
from G., and our cake was gone. That's India!
Tea finished, while we still sat loath to leave, a curious odour
forced itself upon our attention.
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