they have learned to trust him entirely, and go to him in all their
troubles as children go to a father. And he has a very real helpmate
in his wife. I never saw such a busy woman. If she isn't in the
hospital helping at operations (she has a medical degree), she is
teaching girls to sew, or women to read, and yet the children are
beautifully cared for, and the house excellently managed. I suppose
most women would pity Mrs. Russel sincerely. She passes her life in a
place many miles from another European, with absolutely no society,
no gaieties, no theatres, not even shops where she can while away
the time buying things she doesn't want. Yet I never met a woman so
utterly satisfied with her lot. Honestly, I don't think she has a
single thing left to wish for: devoted to her husband, devoted to her
children, heart and soul in her work.

"If only," she sometimes says, "it would go on! The children will have
to go home very soon--the tragedy of Anglo-Indian life."

They are such dear children, Ronald and Robert and tiny Jean. The boys
speak Santali like little natives, and even their English has an odd
turn. When little Jean was born they were greatly interested in the
first white baby they had seen, and Ronald said rapturously:

"Oh, Mummy, aren't ladies darlings when they are babies?"

Their mother found them one day bending over the cradle, arguing as to
why the baby cried.

Ronald said, "She has no teeth, for that reason she cries."

Robert said, "She has no hair, for that reason she cries."