The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1890-06-08
A HIMALAYAN GHOST.

From London Truth.
Do believe in ghosts Well, I'm not natu-
rally superstitious, and don't read the Nine
teenh Century articles on telepathy and all
that sort of thing. I've never been to dark
seance-at least. only once, when was ayoung
ster, and then it was to sit by pretty woman
| was in love with in those days. But somehow
I've never got over curious thing that hap
pened to me at hill station in the Hmalayas
one hot weather. Pm not hill captain by any
means. Only l was pretty well 'jacked-up"
with fever after long April tiger-shoot in the
Terai, and pig-sticlling, not wisely but too
much, in the khadir after that; so, as the
''needful' was not forthcoming for run home,
! was glad to totter up to hill station on sick
leave for month or two. Unless you've been
to the Jungfraublick at 1nterlaken, or one OF
the Engadine hotels, fellows on Home Service
can't we'll imagine what glorious change it is
after the swetering heat of the Bengal plains
especially in June, just before the monsoon
breaks to find ones self on the pine slopes and
in the ozone of the Himalayas
At first did nothing but sit about in one Of
those long arm-chars one only finds in India,
and look on at the life around me from the
CHEEKY, cool verandah of Tolley's Hotel at
Barafghar. OF course, l knew everybody by
sight or name, for Anglo-Indian societyis about
the smallest circle anybody can possibly move
in, and Tolley's Hotel was the very centre of all
life and fun in that particular hill station.
Like most Indian hotels it was long, single
stored building, built of mud bricks, and with
an enormous matched roof. There was great
central transept, as it were, for dning-room,
and from this large wing branched off on
either side, one wing being devoted to married
couples and ladies' whether detached or encum-
bered while the other was bachelors barrack
or ''chummery.'
A shady and very deep yerandah ran the
whole length of the hotel front, In the centre Of
which and in front of the French windows Of
the dining-room was the general lounge, reading
and smoking-roo of the hotel. 1t was very
lively and socable. Both wings were divided
into innumerable little suites of rooms, each
suite having its entrance-door looking on to the
long verandah have mentioned, and the usual
way in and out of the hotel was by broad
fight of fern and passion flower bordered steps,
leading down from the centre of the verandah
to the Mall, which ran below the hotel gardens.
The space between the hotel and the Mall was
great rockery, covered with splendid ferns
in the midst of which a few giant deodars stood
up and shaded the building-while the trellis-
work in front of the yerandah was literally a
tangle of exquisite creepers-passion flowers
and great blue convolvuluses being especially
numerous.
From the far end of the 'Patcherey," as the
married wing was called, a steep footpath led
by the servants huts and the kitchen up to the
pine forest that clothes the hillside thckly all
round Barafghar
AS l was entirely looker-on at the local
game | naturally saw great deal of it, and
In tol< "a an in
combinations and schisms of the station life. l
got to know to a nicely when Capt. Peacock
would canter by with Mrs. Golightly, and always
knew when Miss litter expected her fdnce to
afternoon tea. And | saw the very first dawn
of bitter enmity between Mrs. Gen. Perkins and
Mrs Chief Commissioner Smith, the CdlSd teter-
rinla beHi being that Mrs Smith got consign-
ment of "Europe clothes before Mrs. Perkins.
The official code of precedence was little vague
as to their relative rank but the Europe box
settled it decisively, if not with official hall
mark. / could soon tell exactly how many
whiskies and sodas Maj. Puflin would drink be-
tween tif1in and dinner, and how many fingers
of whisky he took with each.
There was one very beautiful woman staying
in the hotel, a Mrs x. She was the last
woman in the world that you would expect to
be prudish, and yet no breath of scandal ever
dulled the mirror Of her good name / never
met her before and never have since, but heard
that her husband was quiet man, much older
than she and very much given to snubbing her
for what he called her sentimental rot"
Whether it was sentiment or whether it was
pure kindliness of nature I do not know; per-
haps it was sort of sweet sympathy for those
who kicked over the traces between which she
logged along so placidly, but she seemed to be
on good terms with everybody, downto the most
frisky grass widow and most barefaced hill cap
tain in the place. Mrs. Golightly, indeed, was
a special friend of hers. l often wondered what
she could possibly see to like in that peculiarly
Vapid and highty little woman, but they were
somehow inseparable Mrs. G. was always run
ming in to Tolley's and gushing round Mrs.
x, and of course Peacock was at her heels.