who had succeeded my husband in the and who had come in for the title probably some distant cousin whom i had never seen or heard of and should never meet in this world well well i had thought once that i was a too i was a now in nothing but my legal name and those whom i had known and those with whom i had had communication were all dead and gone i never told the princess of that last discovery she fancied dear sweet woman that she was that i was getting over my great sorrow she fancied that i was in a measure forgetting my sorrows or if not forgetting them that i was at least contented in my new life how was she to know that i was wont night after night night after night to sit in my beautiful spacious rooms going back over the past in a cage wandering round and round like a bird in a cage crying like s i can t get out i can t get out and yet knowing in my own mind that i had nowhere to go nobody to whom i could fly that if i broke away from the bond of her kindness i had no refuge no plans no hope was ever any poor girl so utterly desolate before i think not somehow in spite of all the love and care which the princess upon me the stately magnificence and serenity of the life at seemed to me i had been used to plenty of like all other indians of position but the troops of and at oppressed me there was so much pomp so much ceremony about everything that we did if we went for a drive our way led us among who seemed to exist only for the purpose of giving age to their lady it was wonderful to me that the princess was aa her daughter had been so remarkably simple in her personal tastes and manners for she seemed and indeed was a veritable not by her own will bat according to the manners and customs of the people over whom she ruled owing to the princess s very deep and my own we were naturally extremely quiet in our life indeed we lived so far as society was concerned in almost total to me it was a life of heaven knows i had do desire for but there were times when i would have liked to have seen people who did not when i would have rejoiced in stiff knees and straight backs it was the princess s natural atmosphere this atmosphere of homage to me it was and yet what could i do she clung to me desperate the strange story of life affection and she said to me one day you are tired of place don t like oh yea i replied not speaking oat of sheer pity for the hunger in her sweet eyes but it is a life that i am not quite used to princess it is a life to which i have not yet grown accustomed i think if i might have a saddle horse and ride every day that i should feel more like myself i have ridden all my life i wonder would it be possible for me to get a riding habit anywhere near here my dear child we will send to for a tailor at once oh but that would be such a trouble pray don t think of it i said choking down the but wish with s self sense of my own base ingratitude but the hint had been good enough for her within a week a tailor arrived from and i was measured and fitted for several riding habits each as would be suitable for almost any temperature tou should have spoken before said the princess when i half reproached her with me too much the horses are there doing nothing what is one more or less or a riding habit or two if will make you happier it is a very simple matter i have spoken to them in the stables and i find that there are two english horses broken to carry a lady they are at your disposal from moment so i found a new distraction in my life and for a few weeks i was vastly thereby but even horse exercise did not fill the awful want and gap in my life no i rode here and there through the lovely scenery over the great estate into the neighbouring is a cage towns followed by a groom and sometimes i even to go by but i was not the better for it i was for my old life for those i had los yearning for my freedom the freedom that would have been no me to me yoa will be more happy when comes home said the princess one day to me i had not i that i was looking a little dismal or shall i say a uttle more dismal than i know that i was feeling more dejected and more lonely and forsaken than i had ever felt in all my life before yon will be better when comes he will not be long now the princess went oa i heard from him his morning while yoa were oat he sails from cape town to day i had no especial interest in this of whom she spoke bo oft and of whom she had such great hopes yon see i had known anything of foreign races all the men that i had known in india had been englishmen of the same class soldiers and high officials and the men whom i had seen in and did not commend themselves to me by comparison with those to whom i had been i had an idea that prince be like all the others that i had seen with his hair standing ap 