MISS ROBERTS'S RINDOSTAN.
THOUGH rather minutely elaborated in some of the descriptions both of natural scenery and of the practices of social life, these volumes form a very agreeable, and to us it appears a very true and complete picture of India in the Bengal Presidency. We are introduced by our fair guide into the recesses of Anglo-Indian life, as well as shown its external and holyday appearances. The mode in which the majority of the ladies contrive to kill time—the way in which a few do, or might occupy it—the domestic grievances 'with which they have to struggle—the numbers, uses, and cha- racters of the servants—the size, furniture, and general effect, both of rooms and houses—are presented to us, as well as accounts .of public amusements, formal parties, courtly pageants, and descrip- tions of Calcutta and other Eastern cities.
But towns and town-life are far from, being the only subjects which occupy the pen of Miss ROBERTS. She takes her reader to the residences, the cantonments, and the jungle; painting the daily life as it exists in those places, with its few enjoyments and its many drawbacks, and showing how an adventitious social cha- racter is impressed upon the civilized dwellers beyond the pale of civilization. The courts of the native princes, moreover, occupy her pen,—or, to speak more truly, the court of the sole independent native prince, the King of Oude, with his Viceroy over him. Indian field sports, Hindu° and Maliometan superstitions, the features of inanimate nature, the various tribes of animal creatures, and the appearance of the elements both in auger and repose, arQ
• A heavy n hip made from the hide of the hippopotamus,
• described; and, having exhausted the living, our author gives so' deplorable an account of the neglected state of the different English burial-places, that if few from her description would willingly live in India, still fewer would like to die there.
These volumes cannot be called either charming or delightful; for they are too exact and too literal to be either one or the other; and perhaps truth is of too stern a nature to permit either of those qualities to appear even in description. Something of repetition, too, may be felt, from a defect in the plan ; several places of the same class being described in detail, when one might have sufficed to convey a general idea. Those who have read much upon the subject of India and Indian life, may also meet with a good deal —not like, but—resembling what they have read before. But we suspect that any change would have destroyed the character and value of the work, by getting rid of its minute fulness. The whole is not so much the result of observation, as the observations themselves, from which the reader may form his own conclusions; and, abstracting the effects of sensation and experience, we should: be inclined to say that he may judge as: well as if he were upon the spot. Recommending the work generally, we should not do our duty to any fair readers who may be revolving an Indian offer in esse or in posse, if we did not impress upon them the advantage of consulting these volumes before filially deciding ; especially the chapters on Bengal Bridals and Bridal Candidates, on Shopping, and on Feminine Employments, Amusements, and Domestic Economy.
It must not be inferred from what has been said that the styli of Miss ROBERTS is heavy, or her manner dry. On the contrary, her descriptions are mostly graphic, her narratives often amusing, and her remarks judicious. The characteristic we spoke of has arisen from her exhausting process. The best way, however, is to let the writer speak for herself; though we cannot find room for one fourth part of the passages marked.
SINGLE LADIES IN INDIA.
The greatest drawback upon the chances of happiness in an Indian marriage, exists in the sort of compulsion sometimes used to effect the consent of a lady. Many young women in India may be considered almost homeless ; their parents or friends have no means of providing for them except by a matrimonial esta- blishment ; they feel that they are burdens upon families who can ill afford to support them, and they do not consider themselves at liberty to refuse an offer, although the person proposing may not be particularly agreeable to them. Mrs. Malaprop tells us, that it is safest to begin with a little aversion, and the truth of her aphorism has been frequently exemplified in India : gratitude and esteem are admirable substitutes for love; they last much longer, and the affection, based upoe such solid supports, is purer in its nature, and far more durable than that which owes itsexistence to mere fancy. It is rarely that a wife leaves the protection of her husband ; and in the instances that have occurred, it is gene-
rally observed that the lady has made a love-match. • "
There cannot be a more wretched situation than that of a young woman who has been induced to follow the fortunes of a married sister, under the delusive expectation that she will exchange the privations attached to limited means is England for the far-famed luxuries of the East. The husband .is usually de- sirous to lessen the regret of his wife at quitting her home, by persuading an affectionate relative to accompany her, and does not calculate beforeliend the expense and inconvenience which he has entailed upon himself by the additional burden.
Soon after their arrival in India, the family, in all probability, have to travel to an up-country station ; and here the poor girl's troubles begin. She is thrust into au outer cabin in a budgerow, or into an inner room in a tent ; she makes perhaps a third in a buggy, and finds herself always iusthe way ; she discovers that she is a source of continual expense; that an additional person in a family imposes the necessity of keeping several additional servants, and where there is not a close carriage, she must remain a prisoner. She cannot walk out beyond the garden or the verandah ; and all the out-of-door recreations in which she may have been accustomed to indulge in at home are denied her. Tending flowers, that truly feminine employment, is an utter impossibility; the garden may be full of plants (which she has only seen in their exotic state) in all the abundance and beauty of native luxuriance, but except before the sun has risen, or after it has set, they are not to be approached ; and even then, the frame is too completely enervated by the climate to admit of those little pleasing labours, which render the greenhouse and the parterre so interesting. She may be condemned to a long melancholy sojourn at some out-station, offering little society, and none to her taste. If she should be musical, so much the worse ; the hot winds have split her piano and her guitar, or the former is in a wretched condition, and there is no- body to tune it ; the white ants have demolished her music books, and new ones are not to be had. Drawing offers a better resource, but it is often sue- pended from want of materials; and needle-work is not suited to the climate. Her brother and sister are domestic, and do not sympathize in her ennui; they either see little company, or invite guests merely with a view to be quit of an incumbrance. If the few young men who may beat the station should not entertain matri- monial views, the 3r will be shy of their attention to a single woman, lest expec- tations should be formed which they are not inclined to fulfil. It is dangerous to hand a disengaged lady too often to table ; for though no conversation may take place between the parties, the gentleman's silence is attributed to want of courage to speak, and the offer, if not forthcoming, is inferred. A deter- termined flirt may certainly succeed in drawing a train of admirers around her; but such exhibitions are not common; and where ladies are exceedingly scarce, they are sometimes subject to very extraordinary instances of neglect. These are sufficiently frequent to be designated by a peculiar phrase ; the wife or sis- ter who may be obliged to accept a relative's arm, or walk alone, is said to be " wrecked and perhaps an undue degree of apprehension is entertained upon the subject,—a mark of rudeness of this nature reflecting more discredit upon the persons who can be guilty of it, than upon those subjected to the affront. Few young women, who have accompanied their married sisters to India, pos- sess the means of returning home ; however strong their dislike may be to the country, their lot is cast in it, and they must remain in a state of miserable de- pendence, with the danger of being left unprovided for before them, until they shall be rescued from this distressing situation by an offer of marriage.
INDIAN DESIRABLES.
In the dearth of actual possessions, expectancies become of consequence : andnow that old civilians are less attainable, young writers rank amongst the eli- gibles. A supply of these desirables, by no means adequate to the demand, is brought out to Calcutta every year ; and upon the arrival of a young man wh. has been lucky enough to secure a civil appointment, he is immediately accom- modated =dated 1V4h g handsome suite of apartments u Tank Sguara, ear du, tinction, " the Buildings," and entered at the College ; where he is condemned to the study of the Hindoostanee and Persian languages, until he can pass an exa- mination which shall qualify him to become an assistant to a judge, collector, or other official belonging to the civil department. A few bouts of the day are spent under the surveillance of a moonshee, or some more Teamed pundit, and the remainder are devoted to amusements. This is the dangerous period for young men bent upon making for tunes in India, and upon returning home. They are usually younger sons, disregarded in England on account of the slen- derness of their finances, or too juvenile to have attracted matrimonial specula- tions. Launched into the society of Calcutta, they enact the parts of the young Dukes and heirs apparent of a London circle ; where there arc daughters or sisters to dispose of. The "great parti" is :messed, fked, dressed at, danced at, and flirted with, until perfectly bewildered ; either falling desperately in love, or fancying himself so, he makes an offer, which is eagerly accepted by some young lady, too happy to escape the much-dreaded horrors of a half-batta station. The writers, of course, speedily acquire a due sense of their import.• ance, and conduct themselves accordingly. Vainly do the gay uniforms strive to compete with their more sombre rivals; no dashing cavalry officer, feathered, and sashed, and epauletted, has a chance against the men privileged to wear a plain coat and a round hat ; and in the evening drives in Calcutta, sparkling eyes will be turned away from the military equestrian, gracefully reining up his Arab steed to the carriage-window, to rest upon some awkward rider, who sits his horse like a sack, and, more attentive to his own comfurt than to the elegance of his appearance, may, if it should bathe rainy season, have thrust his white jean trousers into jockey- hoots, and introduced a black velvet waistcoat under his white calico jacket. Figures even more extraordinary are not rare; for, though the ladies follow European fashions as closely as circumstances will admit, few gentlemen, not compelled by general orders to attend strictly to the regulations of the service, are willing to sacrifice to the Graces. An Anglo- Indian dandy is generally a very grotesque personage ; for where tailors have little sway, and individual taste is left to its own devices, the attire will be found to present strange incongruities.
CALCUTTA ETIQUF.TTE.
Mackenzie and Lyall, and Leyburn and Co., have establishments similar to that of Messrs. Tullohs, but neither so extensive nor so splendid. The sircars in attendance,—fine gentlemen, profusely arrayed in white muslin, and evidently fattening upon their pi olits,—assume a cavalier air, and seem to take any dispa- ragement of their empl.,yels' goods in high dudgeon.- A uetion-roonis are at. tidied to the premises el bath these parties ; and the heads of all the establish- ments are expected to officiate in turn. This is a sine qua non ; and many gentlemen, who would otherwise have devoted their time and property to mer- cantile pursuits, have been prevented from entering into a partnership with these firms, iu consequence of the unpleasant nature of the duties. According to the old system, an auctioneer, however respectable his connexions might be, and what- ever his previous rank, was not admitted into society. The rigid exclusiveness of etiquette has somewhat relaxed in the present day ; and military and civil servants do not object to meet at other houses, or receive at their own those persons who were hirmerly considered to be quite beyond the pale. Still the .:scent of the rostrum is considered to entail the loss of caste ; and it is supposed that tie rigid enforcement of the rule is made to preserve equality amongst the partners ot the establishment, who are or were all rendered equally unpresent- able at the Viceregal court.
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