Another drag upon my hands is the care of a small European boy, who was lately found up in Cabul, and is supposed to be the son of some soldier of the destroyed army. He has been brought up as a Mussulman, and made to believe his father was such, and is a very bigot. Colonel Lawrence sent him to me from Lahore, but forgot to write about him, so I know no more of him than I have seen in the newspapers, and have no idea what to do with him, or where he is to go. He is rather a nuisance, and I shall be glad when he goes, as there is little but his odd fate to interest one in him; and I have considerable doubts as to his genuine origin. He is more like a half-caste than an "European." Our communication is brief, as he speaks but little Hindostanee, and I less Persian. The Asylum is a much more interesting occupation, as, independently of its object, there is a pleasure in covering a fine mountain with buildings of one's own designing.
My last few days at the Asylum were enlivened by the arrival of Mrs. George Lawrence, whose tent was pitched close to mine, on the hill-top. She is a great acquisition in a forest life, and a very nice person,--the wife of the Captain Lawrence who was one of the Cabul prisoners. She is to be superintendress until the arrival of the future man from England. I have fourteen little girls to take care of, by the same token, and listen to the grumblings of their nurses. In short, I don't know myself, and that is the long and short of it. I am going to Simla for a day or two, to see Mr. Thomason.
The state of things is so provokingly quiet and placid, that there seems but small chance of our being called upon for another rush across country (called a "forced march"), like the one of December, 1845; and one is obliged to take to anything that offers, to avoid the "tædium vitæ" which the want of employment engenders in this "lovely country," in those, at least, who have not learnt to exist in the philosophical medium of brandy and cheroots. Did I tell you, by-the-bye, that I abjured tobacco when I left England, and that I have never been tempted, by even a night "al fresco," to resume the delusive habit? Nor have I told you (because I despaired of your believing it) that I have declined from the paths of virtue in respect to beer also, these two years past, seldom or never even tasting that once idolized stimulant!! It has not been caused alone by a love of eccentricity, but by the very sensitive state of my inner man, (achieved in India,) which obliges me to live by rule. This is all very edifying, no doubt, to _you_; to me it is especially so, for I believe if I get on well in India, it will be owing, physically speaking, to my _digestion_.