aches the ear of the
representatives of the Suzerain Power or the columns of the daily press.

CHAPTER XII

THE LURE OF THE HILLS

A dark pall enveloped the mountains, and over Ranga Duar raged one of
the terrifying tropical thunderstorms that signalise the rains of India.
Unlike more temperate climes this land has but three Seasons. To her the
division of the year into Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter means
nothing. She knows only the Hot Weather, the Monsoon or Rains, and the
Cold Weather. From November to the end of February is the pleasant time
of dry, bright, and cool days, with nights that register from three to
sixteen degrees of frost in the plains of Central and Northern India.
In the Himalayas the snow lies feet deep. The popular idea that
Hindustan is always a land of blazing sun and burning heat is entirely
wrong. But from March to the end of June it certainly turns itself into
a hell of torment for the luckless mortals that cannot fly from the
parched plains to the cool mountains. Then from the last days of June,
when the Monsoon winds bring up the moisture-laden clouds from the
oceans on the south-west of the peninsula, to the beginning or middle
of October, India is the Kingdom of Rain. From the grey sky it falls
drearily day and night. Outside, the thirsty soil drinks it up gladly.
Green things venture timidly out of the parched earth, then shoot up as
rapidly as the beanstalk of the fairy tale. But inside houses dampness
reigns. Green fungus adorns boots and all things of leather, tobacco
reeks with moisture, and the white man scratches himself and curses the
plague of prickly heat.

But while tens of thousands of Europeans and hundreds of millions of
natives suffer greatly in the tortures of Heat and Wet for eight weary
months of the year in the Plains of India, up in the magic realm of the
Hills, in the pleasure colonies like Simla, Mussourie, Naini Tal,
Darjeeling, and Ootacamund, existence during those same months is one long
spell of gaiety and comfort for the favoured few. These hill-stations make
life in India worth living for the lucky English women and men who can take
refuge in them. And incidentally they are responsible for more domestic
unhappiness in Anglo-Indian households than any other cause. It is said
that while in the lower levels of the land many roads lead to the Divorce
Court, in the Hills _all_ do.

For wives must needs go alone to the hill-stations, as a rule. India