is entirely permissible and comfortable during the long, warm nights on the Indian Ocean. The weather, however, was not nearly as warm as we expected to find it. We were four days on the Red Sea and six days on the Indian Ocean, and were entirely comfortable except for two days when the wind was so strong and kicked up so much water that the port-holes had to be closed, and it was very close and stuffy in the cabin. While the sun was hot there was always a cool breeze from one direction or another, and the captain told me it was customary during the winter season.
The passengers on our steamer were mostly English, with a few East Indians, and Americans. You cannot board a steamer in any part of the world nowadays without finding some of your fellow countrymen. They are becoming the greatest travelers of any nation and are penetrating to uttermost parts of the earth. Many of the English passengers were army officers returning to India from furloughs or going out for service, and officers' families who had been spending the hot months in England. We had lots of lords and sirs and lady dowagers, generals, colonels and officers of lesser rank, and the usual number of brides and bridegrooms, on their wedding tours; others were officials of the government in India, who had been home to be married. And we had several young women who were going out to be married. Their lovers were not able to leave their business to make the long voyage, and were waiting for them in Bombay, Calcutta or in some of the other cities. But perhaps the largest contingent were "civil servants," as employes of the government are called, who had been home on leave. The climate of India is very trying to white people, and, recognizing that fact, the government gives its officials six months' leave with full pay or twelve months' leave with half pay every five years. In that way an official who has served five consecutive years in India can spend the sixth year in England or anywhere else he likes.
We had several notable natives, including Judge Nayar, a judicial magistrate at Madras who has gained eminence at the Indian bar and was received with honors in England. He is a Parsee, a member of that remarkable race which is descended from the Persian fire worshipers. He dresses and talks and acts exactly like an ordinary English barrister. There were three brothers in the attractive native dress, Mohammedans, sons of Adamjee Peerbhoy, one of the largest cotton manufacturers and wealthiest men in India, who employs more than 15,000 operatives in his mills and furnished the canvas for the tents and the khaki for the uniforms of the British soldiers during the South African war. These young gentlemen had been making a tour of Europe, combining business with pleasure, and had inspected nearly all the great cotton mills in England and on the continent, picking up points for their own improvement. They are intelligent and enterprising men and their reputation for integrity, ability and loyalty to the British government has frequently been recognized in a conspicuous manner.
Our most notable shipmate was the Right Honorable Lord Lamington, recently governor of one of the Australian provinces, on his way to assume similar responsibility at Bombay, which is considered a more responsible post. He is a youngish looking, handsome man, and might easily be mistaken for Governor Myron T. Herrick of Ohio. One night at dinner his lordship was toasted by an Indian prince we had on board, and made a pleasant reply, although it was plain to see that he was not an orator. Captain Preston, the commander of the ship, who was afterward called upon, made a much more brilliant speech.
The prince was Ranjitsinhji, a famous cricket player, whom some consider the champion in that line of sport. He went over to the United States with an English team and will be pleasantly remembered at all the places he visited. He is a handsome fellow, 25 years old, about the color of a mulatto, with a slender athletic figure, graceful manners, a pleasant smile, and a romantic history. His father was ruler of one of the native states, and dying, left his throne, title and estates to his eldest son. The latter, being many years older than Ranjitsinhji, adopted him as his heir and sent him to England to be educated for the important duty he was destined to perform. He went through the school at Harrow and Cambridge University and took honors in scholarship as well as athletics, and was about to return to assume his hereditary responsibility in Indian when, to the astonishment of all concerned, a boy baby was born in his brother's harem, the first and only child of a rajah 78 years of age. The mother was a Mohammedan woman, and, according to a strict construction of the laws governing such things among the Hindus, the child was not entitled to any consideration whatever. Without going into details, it is sufficient for the story to say that the public at large did not believe that the old rajah was the father of the child, or that the infant was entitled to succeed him even if he had been. But the old man was so pleased at the birth of the baby that he immediately proclaimed him his heir, the act was confirmed by Lord Elgin, the viceroy, and the honors and estates which Ranjitsinhji expected to inherit vanished like a dream. The old man gave him an allowance of $10,000 a year and he has since lived in London consoling himself with cricket.
Another distinguished passenger was Sir Cowasji Jehangir Readymoney, an Indian baronet, who inherited immense wealth from a long line of Parsee bankers. They have adopted as a sort of trademark, a nickname given by some wag to the founder of the family, in the last century because of his immense fortune and success in trade. Mr. Readymoney, or Sir Jehangir, as he is commonly known, the present head of the house, was accompanied by his wife, two daughters, their governess, and his son, who had been spending several months in London, where he had been the object of much gratifying attention. His father received his title as an acknowledgment of his generosity in presenting $250,000 to the Indian Institute in London, and for other public benefactions, estimated at $1,300,000. He built colleges, hospitals, insane asylums and other institutions. He founded a Strangers' Home at Bombay for the refuge of people of respectability who find themselves destitute or friendless or become ill in that city. He erected drinking fountains of artistic architecture at several convenient places in Bombay, and gave enormous sums to various charities in London and elsewhere without respect to race or creed. Both the Roman Catholic and the Presbyterian missions in India have been the recipients of large gifts, and the university at Bombay owes him for its finest building.
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| A BOMBAY STREET |
Several of the most prominent native families in India have followed the example of Mr. Readymoney by adopting the nicknames that were given their ancestors. Indian names are difficult to pronounce. What, for example, would you call Mr. Jamshijdji or Mr. Jijibhai, and those are comparatively simple? Hence, in early times it was the habit of foreigners to call the natives with whom they came in contact by names that were appropriate to their character or their business. For example, "Mr. Reporter," one of the editors of the Times of India, as his father was before him, is known honorably by a name given by people who were unable to pronounce his father's Indian name.
Sir Jamsetjed Jeejeebhoy, one of the most prominent and wealthy Parsees, who is known all over India for his integrity and enterprise, and has given millions of dollars to colleges, schools, hospitals, asylums and other charities, is commonly known as Mr. Bottlewaller. "Waller" is the native word for trader, and his grandfather was engaged in selling and manufacturing bottles. He began by picking up empty soda and brandy bottles about the saloons, clubs and hotels, and in that humble way laid the foundation of an immense fortune and a reputation that any man might envy. The family have always signed their letters and checks "Bottlewaller," and have been known by that name in business and society. But when Queen Victoria made the grandfather a baronet because of distinguished services, the title was conferred upon Jamsetjed Jeejeebhoy, which was his lawful name.
Another similar case is that of the Petit family, one of the richest in India and the owners and occupants of the finest palaces in Bombay. Their ancestor, or the first of the family who distinguished himself, was a man of very small stature, almost a dwarf, who was known as Le Petit. He accepted the christening and bore the name honorably, as his sons and grandsons have since done. They are now baronets, but have never dropped it, and the present head of the house is Sir Manockji Petit.
The Eye of India, as Bombay is called, sits on an island facing the Arabian Sea on one side and a large bay on the other, but the water is quite shallow, except where channels have been dredged to the docks. The scenery is not attractive. Low hills rise in a semicircle from the horizon, half concealed by a curtain of mist, and a few green islands scattered about