mans voiced their pent-up joy, and we sank back in our chairs, well exhausted with the strain of long-continued attention to such dazzling surprises. More flower garlands were dropped on our shoulders and enormous bouquets were presented us. Trays of fruit and cake and sugar things were offered, which we formally praised, accepted, and touched according to custom; and, by the same sign and custom, we never saw the defiled stuff again.
The musicians struck up a deafening pæan, the crowd in the courtyard made way, and we were borne triumphantly on for the great Nautch dance in the choltry, or Hall of a Thousand Columns. That noblest Brahman of them all, who had maintained a particular protectorate over us in the jewel-room and so summarily checked the other Brahmans when they extolled the jewels too full-lunged, all but gave his arm as he escorted us across the court, waving the others aside or pushing them with force when necessary. This arch-heathen, Pattu Thacheadar, the Superb, highest-caste Dikshatar Brahman of the white cord and the carved bead, was altogether the finest specimen Chidambram afforded, and sculptor or painter would equally delight in him as model. This big Brahman beau-ed us gallantly across the courts, up into the lofty pillared hall, and seated us in the waiting arm-chairs with a grace and address that would have become a leader of cotillions—barefooted, with only a red-bordered sheet for his full-dress uniform of social ceremony!
The magistrate, in his scholarly, gold-bowed spectacles, and the disdainful little goddess, Thun-
