place in Sussex, which he used to farm and shoot in the intervals of travelling, and which he expected me to take over when he died.

But farming—even with a certain backing of cash—did not appeal to me, and I drifted into the army. Then, much to the annoyance of my father, who wanted me to soldier at home since I would go into the service, I transferred to an Indian regiment. Travel always appealed to me, especially in the less well-known parts of the globe, and India seemed a convenient kicking-off place. One got long leave, which the army at home does not legislate for; and blessed with a little money, I was able to indulge my hobby to the full.

Central Asia became my playground, and, whenever I could get leave, I sped up to Kashmir and thence up one or other of the valleys into the great sleepy spaces that lie behind, the desiccated bone-dry spaces of Ladakh, or among the snow-clad mountains that fringe the north of Lalla Rookh’s country.

Then came the war, and, after frantic panics that I was going to be out of it all, tearful wires to pals at Simla, despairing[5] appeals to every general I had ever met, I found myself in France, and entered upon a series of panics for fear I shouldn’t get away again.

[5]

After longer or shorter periods of mud, boredom, and fright, with a spell of hospital inserted, my regiment went on to that benighted back front, East Africa, a spot for which I conceived the most intense loathing, and was glad to find myself back once more in India in late 1917. A spell of dépôt work, and off again to Palestine and later to Cyprus, where, though life was uneventful, I amused myself brushing up the Greek I had learnt travelling during the holidays with my father. I am pretty good at languages, and had kept up my Greek, so that by the time I left Cyprus I spoke it as fluently as ever again.

In 1919 my father’s death led me home to settle up the estate, and then out again, with the firm intention of leaving the army within the year.

A bout of frontier scrapping in the 1920 Waziristan show was my last effort, and then I really made up my mind to go straight away. I was blessed with ample independent means—ample enough for me anyway; most of my regimental pals were dead, and so in 1920 I sent in my papers.

I had shot most things to be found about Northern India, but had never secured a tiger, and so made up my mind for a visit to the Central Provinces before going home. I wandered down 

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