gunge, Brace told
me, was quite a small place, in a beautifully wooded, mountainous
country, where there was jungle and cane-brake, with plenty of sport for
those who cared for it, the rajah being ready enough to get up
shooting-parties and find elephants and beaters for a grand tiger battue
from time to time.

It was quite a new experience to me, all the preparations for the
evacuation of the barracks, and I stared with astonishment at the size
of the baggage-train, with the following of servants, grooms, tentmen,
elephants, and camels, deemed necessary to accompany our marches. It
was like the exodus of some warlike tribe; but, as Brace told me, it was
quite the regular thing.

"You see, everything is done to spare our men labour. Their profession
is to fight, and as long as they do that well, John Company is willing
that they should have plenty of assistance to clean their horses, guns,
and accoutrements."

Our marches were always made in the very early morning, many of our
starts being soon after midnight, and a curious scene it was in the
moonlight, as the long train, with its elephants laden with tents, and
camels moaning and grumbling at the weight of the necessaries they were
doomed to carry, the light flashing from the guns or the accoutrements
of the mounted men, and all on and on, over the sandy dust, till I grew
drowsy, and nodded over my horse's neck, rousing myself from time to
time with a start to ask whether it was not all some dream.

Just as the sun was getting unpleasantly hot, and the horses caked with
sweat and dust, a halt would be called in some shady tope, where the
tents rose as if by magic, fires were rapidly lighted by the attendants,
and, amidst quite a babel of tongues, breakfast was prepared, while
parroquets of a vivid green shrieked at us from the trees, squirrels
leaped and ran, and twice over we arrived at a grove to find it tenanted
by a troop of chattering monkeys, which mouthed and scolded at us till
our men drove them far into the depths of the jungle with stones.

Here, with our tents set up in the shade of the trees, we passed the hot
days, with the sun pouring down with such violence that I have often
thought it might be possible for a loaded gun to get heated enough to
ignite the powder. There would be plenty of sleeping, of course, with
the sentries looking longingly on, and wishing it was their turn; and
then, soon after midnight, the column would be _en route_ again,