George and I walked to a new aviary, or rather pheasantry, that we have been making out of a mock ruin in the garden, and there, in the midst of our new gold pheasants, which we have imported from China at vast expense to ourselves and vast trouble to , was an immense snake, a sort of serpent, hopping and skipping about the trees in the aviary; quite harmless, the native gardener said, only it was fond of eating birds—our birds, our new birds. He caught it and crammed it into a kedgeree pot, where it was precisely a reel in a bottle. It is all very well, and India is a very nice country; but, from early and perhaps bad habits, I prefer a place where we can go and feed the poultry without finding a great flying serpent whisking and wriggling about.
George and I came down to Calcutta very late, leaving the rest of the party to come down by water in the morning. Our only incident was passing Wright and Giles, expostulating in English with a kicking Indian horse, who was trying, with every prospect of success, to overturn Wright’s carriage.
My days are very quiet and uninterrupted. From nine in the morning till airing time I see nobody except at luncheon, which does not last long. Yesterday we dined early to go to a benefit of a tiresome Madame , who has actually persuaded us into going, by letters and petitions, &c. It was a sort of concert—songs out of various operas, remarkably ill sung by people dressed in character. Madame is an exaggeration of the Duchesse de Caniggaro, only fatter, and she was dressed as Tancredi; it almost made the concert amusing. Luckily it was all over by ten. We have got two more benefits to do, and then I think all furthe theatricals may be avoided for the hot season. George at first did not mean to do , as I handsomely offered to do it alone; and, to fill the box, I asked Mr. and Mrs. and several other people to go with me.
Tuesday morning a huge box of lovely articles—shawls, kinkobs, turbans, &c.—was sent to me to look at. They belonged to a Mrs. , a native woman of very high caste and very beautiful, who was married both by the Mussulman and Protestant rites to an English Colonel , who took her to England last year, and he died on the passage home. She has never changed her native habits, cannot speak a word of English, and is quite helpless and ignorant. She came back in the ship that took her out under the care of her eldest boy, who has been brought up at home and cannot speak a word of Hindustani; so he and his mother cannot have much communication. All the magnificent trousseau which Colonel provided for her use in England has never been touched. They say it is quite melancholy to see her sitting on the floor, as natives do, with a coarse veil over her head, moaning over her loss. Her children are all brought up at home as English people, and she will never see them again. I bought on speculation for the Duchess of Sutherland the most beautiful silver-embroidered dress I ever saw. She told me when I left England to buy some fine Indian muslin for her, but I have never before seen any so fine as this. The whole article was unique, and I hope she will like it, as it was a large outlay; but price is no object to her.
We had our dance in the evening, rather a gay one apparently.
Wednesday morning I went in Fanny’s place to the school committee, which seemed very peaceable, and in the evening we went to see ‘Masaniello,’ which the French Company have got up, and acted last week to an enthusiastic audience. I thought it an absolute miracle in our favour that we were at Barrackpore at the time; but the subscribers, by way of consoling us for that disappointment, proposed to have it over again, contrary to the rules of the subscription, and wrote to beg we would not miss such a perfect opera. The ‘prima donna’ really surpassed herself in it. So kind; but it is very hot. However, we went and were received with great applause; I don’t know why, for I cannot recollect that we have done anything very good lately except stew ourselves to jellies at the theatre. The opera was really wonderfully well got up for such small means as they have, and I thought ‘the ’ did the dumb girl wonderfully, considering she does not understand a word of French, and therefore never knew what she was making signs to.