and a long-necked silver ewer, with which to pour water over soiled
hands. This basin and ewer delighted me, for in shape they were
exactly like the ones that "the little captive maid" was offering to
Naaman's wife in a picture which hung in my nursery as a child, I
liked watching the graceful play of the wrists and arms of the
Maharanee and her daughters as they conveyed food to their mouths; it
was a contrast to the clumsy, ineffectual efforts of the Europeans.

The aide-de-camp looked so wonderfully natural as a Rajput prince (and
that, too, without any brown make-up) that we wished him to dress-up
in the same clothes next day and to go and write his name on the
Viceroy, to see if he could avoid detection.

These sorts of impersonations have to be done very thoroughly if they
are to succeed. I have recounted elsewhere how my father won the
rowing championship of the Mediterranean with his four-oar, in 1866.
The course being such a severe one, his crew had to train very
rigorously. It occurred to my father, who was extremely fond of boxing
himself, that a little daily practice with the gloves might with
advantage form part of the training. He accordingly had four pairs of
boxing-gloves sent out from England, and he and the crew had daily
bouts in our coach-house. The Duc de Vallombrosa was a great friend of
my family's, and used to watch this boxing with immense interest. The
Duc was a huge man, very powerfully built, but had had no experience
with the gloves. The present Sir David Erskine was the youngest member
of the crew, and was very slender and light built, and it struck my
father one day that it would be interesting to see this comparative
stripling put on the gloves with the great burly Frenchman. Sir David
realised that his only chance with his huge brawny opponent was to
tire him out, for should this formidable Colossus once get home on