be lovely. Dr. Wallich, of the Botanical Garden (a great man in botanical history), has given me seven hundred plants, which would be exotics of great value if we were not acting in that capacity ourselves, and he is come here himself this afternoon to see that they are all put in the right places. The mornings between five and and a quarter past six are really delightful, and it is a pity that getting up early is so fatiguing, which it certainly is. Gibson is going up the country in ten days to collect for the Duke of Devonshire, so he was very anxious to finish my garden first. George came out at six. It was great fun giving a poke at the bottom of a flower-pot and turning out a nice little plant—like Greenwich days, even though the poor little flower was received by twelve black gardeners very lightly dressed. I crept down the back stairs through Wright’s room, in the hope of avoiding all my own people, who were asleep at my room door; but I had not been out five minutes before they all came pouring out setting their turbans and sashes. It sometimes strikes me that we Europeans are mad people, sent out here because we are dangerous at home, and that our black keepers are told never to
