rocity.

The city lies at the bottom of a valley, on the banks of a little lake
which is surrounded by pagodas, which bathe their walls in the water.

At a distance the city looks like a white spot which grows larger as one
approaches it, and by degrees one discovers the domes and spires, all
the slender and graceful summits of Indian monuments.

At about an hour's distance from the gates, I met a superbly caparisoned
elephant, surrounded by a guard of honor which the sovereign had sent
me, and I was conducted to the palace with great ceremony.

I should have liked to have taken the time to put on my gala uniform,
but royal impatience would not admit of it. He was anxious to make my
acquaintance, to know what he might expect from me, and then he would
see.

I was introduced into a great hall surrounded by galleries, in the midst
of bronze-colored soldiers in splendid uniforms, while all about were
standing men dressed in striking robes studded with precious stones.

I saw a shining mass, a kind of sitting sun reposing on a bench like
our garden benches, without a back; it was the rajah who was waiting for
me, motionless, in a robe of the purest canary color. He had some ten or
fifteen million francs worth of diamonds on him, and by itself, on his
forehead glistened the famous star of Delhi, which has always belonged
to the illustrious dynasty of the Pariharas of Mundore, from whom my
host was descended.

He was a man of about five-and-twenty, who seemed to have some negro
blood in his veins, although he belonged to the purest Hindoo race. He
had large, almost motionless, rather vague eyes, fat lips, a curly
beard, low forehead, and dazzling sharp white teeth, which he frequently
showed with a mechanical smile. He got up and gave me his hand in the
English fashion, and then made me sit down beside him on a bench which
was so high that my feet hardly touched the ground, and I was very
uncomfortable on it.

He immediately proposed a tiger hunt for the next day; war and hunting
were his chief occupations, and he could hardly understand how one could
care for anything else. He was evidently fully persuaded that I had only
come all that distance to amuse him a little, and to be the companion of
his pleasures.

As I stood greatly in need of his assistance, I tried to flatter his
tastes, and he was so pleased with me that he immediately wished to show
me how his trained boxers fought, and he led the way into a kind of