Here I am off again like a steam-engine, calling at a series of stations, puffing and panting, hither and thither, never resting, ever starting; now in a cutting, now in a tunnel; first in a field, next on a hill: thus passes day after day, week after week, a great deal of work going through one's hands, and yet one can give very little account of one's self at the end of it. At present I am moving rapidly along the banks of a small canal which traverses the Doâb, between the Ravee and Beas rivers, for purposes of irrigation; accompanying Major Napier,[5] to whom the prosecution of all public improvements throughout the Land of the Five Rivers belongs. We (the "Woods and Forests" of the day) have nearly reached the point where the river debouches from the hills, and have put up for the day in a little garden-house of Runjeet Singh's, in the midst of a lovely grove of great extent, through whose dark-green boughs we have a splendid panorama of the snowy range to back our horizon. We have great projects of extending the canal by various branches to feed and fertilize the whole extent of the Doâb, which wants nothing but water to make it a garden, so fertile is the soil. We have come along a strip of beautiful country, richly cultivated, lying along the banks of this life-giving little watercourse, and the weather is perfect, so I am as happy as mere externals can make one. Certainly we whose lot has fallen on this side of India, are much to be envied. Here, all day long, one rides about, clothed as warmly, and even more so, than in England at this season, enjoying the bright clear sunshine, and never troubled with thinking of the sun; whilst at Calcutta they are running into their houses at nine o'clock to avoid the heat of the day! I imagine two years in Calcutta would be more _wearing_ than ten up here; by the same token, I have achieved the respectable weight of eleven stone ten pounds, being an increase of seventeen pounds since July. May my shadow never be less!
I live from the arrival of one mail in expectation of the next. I had meant to have written a long series of despatches for this opportunity, and have asked you to do some commissions for me, but I must postpone it now to another time, as Major Napier has lots of work for me. I want a pair of thick blankets; mine were plundered at Ferozeshah, and I have always mourned over them since, when cold nights and long marches come together. In these far countries it is next to impossible to get anything decent.