Eveleen had returned from Bab-us-Sahel full of good resolutions, determined to take Mrs Gibbons as her model from henceforth. She would never want to ride at unorthodox hours—virtue was assisted in this respect by the heat,—and she would benefit society by starting a farmyard and kitchen-garden. Unfortunately for her good intentions, Qadirabad was a very different place from Bab-us-Sahel, since mutton, poultry, and vegetables were all easy to get. She relinquished with a sigh the idea of a sheep-farm and chicken-run, but a garden she would have, and achieved—with the aid of the Residency mali and his underlings—success of a sort. The mali had an unfair advantage in the perpetual contests waged between them, since he knew his own mind and did not change it from day to day, while Eveleen’s c
