e adopted many English ways.

"My wife has no rival in the zenana. I encourage her to go about, as
our mother did, to look after the affairs of the house, to sit at
table with me, and to be my companion, and not a mere plaything. I am
sure, Margaret, your stay with us will do her much good, and she will
learn a great deal from you."

"You have heard no news since you last wrote, Mortiz?"

A slight cloud passed across the Rajah's animated face.

"None, Margaret. We have little news from beyond the mountains. Tippoo
hates us, who are the friends of the English, as much as he hates the
English themselves, so there is little communication between Mysore
and the possessions of the Nabob of Arcot. We will talk, later on, of
the plans you wrote of in your last letter to me."

"You do not think that they are hopeless, Mortiz?" Mrs. Holland asked,
anxiously.

"I would not say that they are hopeless," he said gently, "although it
seems to me that, after all these years, the chances are slight,
indeed, that your husband can be alive; and the peril and danger of
the enterprise that, so far as I understood you, you intend your son
to undertake, would be terrible, indeed."

"We see that, Mortiz. Dick and I have talked it over, a thousand
times. But so long as there is but a shadow of a chance of his finding
his father, he is ready to undertake the search. He is a boy in years,
but he has been trained for the undertaking, and will, when the trial
comes, bear himself as well as a man."

"Well, Margaret, I shall have plenty of opportunities for forming my
own judgment; because, of course, he will stay with us a long time
before he starts on the quest, and it will be better to say no more of
this, now.

"Now, tell me about London. Is it so much a greater city than Madras?"

Mrs. Holland sighed. She saw, by his manner, that he was wholly
opposed to her plan, and although she was quite prepared for
opposition, she could not help feeling disappointed. However, she
perceived that, as he said, it would be better to drop the subject for
a time; and she accordingly put it aside, and answered his questions.

"Madras is large--that is, it spreads over a wide extent; but if it
were packed with houses, as closely as they could stand, it would not
approach London in the number of its population."

"How is it that the English do not send more troops out here,
Margaret?"

"Because they can raise troops here, and English soldiers cannot