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wives, do not know how to do enough for a stranger who pays a flying visit to their circle. There are shops which can hardly be surpassed in Regent Street, where the same stranger makes large purchases ; yes; in Quetta everything can be obtained, and there peaches, grapes, and plums ripen in June. But the winter is severe, and then it is not easy to keep the lofty rooms warm.
I spent five delightful days among the officers of Quetta. The political agent, Mr. Tucker, and Majors Archer, Tottenham, and Roddy showed me every attention, and in General Smith Dorrien's house I had a fine time. He had served under Kitchener in South Africa, and his table was decorated by a silver service presented by the people of England.
On May 20 I took leave of all, and lastly of Riza, honest young Riza, who was quite brisk and sunburnt, and had developed no sign of plague. He stood quite downcast looking after me as the train rolled out of Quetta at four o'clock. I had made arrangements for a comfortable and safe journey for him back through Baluchistan ; but, poor fellow, I thought, to have to ride along that everlasting road again in the sun, which would be still hotter now, and to return to Seistan, the plague-stricken land !
The way through valleys and tunnels down to the Indus is extremely picturesque. Though evening and night are coming on the heat increases with every hour. In Kolpur at six o'clock it is 78.4° ; at Mach, barely an hour later, 93.2° ; and at Peshi, at eight o'clock, 98.6°. It is like the mornings in Baluchistan, where the heat increases after sunrise. In Jacobabad we are down on the Indian lowlands and in the district which is considered the hottest in all India. But the windows of the compartment are provided with an excellent contrivance for ventilation—a lattice of root fibres, which is automatically sprinkled with water, and a draught is forced through this screen.
In the middle of the night the train rolls over the great river, Alexander's river, and with the turbid current of the Indus on the left and the vast plains of the Panjab on the east the railway runs north-east. It is suffocatingly hot in the compartment, and the Indian summer vibrates like
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