Not a hundred yards away a heathen temple stands, with its gilded roof
shining in the sun. We tried to go inside it the other day, but an
angel with a flaming sword, in the shape of a _fakir_, kept us out. It
didn't look very attractive. We saw enough when we beheld the post the
poor kids and goats are tied to, all messy and horrid from the last
sacrifice. The priest who forbade us to enter, just to show there was
no ill-feeling, hung wreaths of marigolds round our necks. Boggley,
once we were out of sight, hid his in the ditch, but I, afraid they
might find out and be offended, went about for the rest of the day
decked like any sacrificial goat.

That we are leading the Simple Life I think you would admit if you saw
us at our meals. 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