wood, with flat roofs and parapets at every elevation—roofs that Kim ran over, roofs where the women gasped in "The City of Dreadful Night"; for, although Lahore is so far north, it is one of the hottest places in summer,—Meean Mir cantonment the acknowledged "oven of India," where epidemics always rage their worst.
All Lahore was muffled and bundled in cotton clothes and brilliant chuddas, and all sought the sun that crisp, frosty morning, until the streets held a living, moving rainbow mass and every shop-front seemed set for color effect. Women in gay head-sheets and children in satin jackets sunned themselves in window-frames of dark-brown fretted woodwork; and Mohammedan women in white cloaks falling full from round crown-pieces, with latticed holes for the eyes, wandered in the brilliant company, giving it still more the air of a fancy-dress ball. The carnival crowds, moving against such fantastic background, made one listen for slow music to accompany this stately spectacular march. It seemed as though the Lahore bazaars were but painted wings, drops, and flies, the crowds one well-drilled theatrical troupe—a continuous performance kept up for our benefit. All the industries were picturesque, every shop decorative, and we stood fascinated, to watch the baker reaching down into the deep mud oven with a hooked wire and bringing out pancake loaves of bread; the dyer stirring his vats, wringing out lengths of cloth and festooning them over the front of his shop; the printer, next door, stamping block patterns on turban ends, and the Kash-
