I find that food really matters very little. Our cook
is of the jungle jungly. Autolycus is disgusted with him, and does his
best to reform him. _Chota-hazri_ I have alone, as Boggley is away
inspecting before seven o'clock. I emerge from my tent and find a
table before Boggley's tent with a cloth on it,--not particularly
clean,--a loaf of bread (our bread is made in jail: a _chuprassi_ goes
to fetch it every second day), a tin of butter, and a tin of jam.
Autolycus appears accompanied by the jungly cook, bearing a plate of
what under happier circumstances might have been porridge. A spoonful
or two is more than enough. "No good?" demands Autolycus. "No," and
disdainfully handing the plate back to the entirely indifferent cook,
he proceeds to produce from somewhere about his person a teapot and
two tiny eggs. Luncheon is much worse, for the food that appears is
so incalculably greasy that it argues a more than bowing acquaintance
with native _ghee_. Dinner is luncheon intensified, so tea is really
the only thing we can enjoy. The fact is, if we thought about it we
would never eat at all. I happened to walk round the tent to-day, and
found the dish-washer washing our dishes in water that was positively
thick, and drying them with a cloth that had begun life polishing our
brown boots. I stormed at him in English, and later Boggley stormed
at him in Hindustani, and he vowed it would never happen again; but
I dare say if I were to look round at this minute, I should find him
doing exactly the same thing; and I don't really care so long as
neither of us perishes with cholera as a result.
Pages:
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155