broad, and clear from it, as if by magic, a mess piled up to the
greatest capacity of the vessel, and consisting of rice, garnished at
the top with a couple of pounds or so of curried meat or fish; after
which, glaring around him in a hungry and dissatisfied manner,
calculated to raise unpleasant sensations in a nervous bystander, he
would sullenly catch hold of the hookah common to the party, and seek
to deaden his appetite by swallowing down long and repeated draughts
of tobacco-smoke, until the tears came into his eyes, and he was
forced to desist by a paroxysm of coughing.

Among the passengers, there were two or three persons of my own
standing, and on the quarter-deck a small group of officers, one of
whom was accompanied by his wife. The lady had certainly no reason to
grumble at the inattention of her companions. The fair sex, although
much more plentiful at the time I speak of than ten years ago, was
still rather scarce in these parts, ladies being few and far between
in the stations beyond Kurachee. With a praiseworthy desire to make
the most of the honour, the skipper was bustling about, giving all
sorts of orders that might in any way conduce to the comfort of his
fair passenger, and apparently in a state of mental agony when a
momentary turn of the vessel would render the awning and screens
ineffectual in preserving her from a chance ray of the sun. Two young
subalterns were tumbling over one another in the anxious endeavour to
be the first to bring a footstool; a couple of their seniors were
standing by, rubbing their hands and smiling blandly, to keep their
minds in a fit state for the perpetration of a compliment on the first
possible occasion; while even the grim old major was trying very hard
to unbend: not that it was a part of his principles to be particularly
gallant to the ladies, but as he was going to a place where he might
not have the advantage of seeing any of them for some years, and would
thus run the chance of growing rusty, he thought he might as well keep
his hand in while he had the opportunity.

After running down the coast till the sun became so uncomfortably hot
as to render an awning over the whole vessel an indispensable
necessary, we suddenly struck into one of the many creeks with which
the Delta of the Indus is everywhere interlaced. The vessel did not
answer her helm well; and as the breadth of the stream did not much
exceed her length, we were for some time running ashore, fir