Madras 29th March 1811

Here I am, my dear Mother, preparing to write to you again, from another quarter of the globe, & with a thousand more strange things to tell you of --- the first and greatest of wh. is that I am ordered to join my own corps at Jaulnah and consequently have to undertake a journey of 700 miles over the Plains of Hindostan. -- I am now all business and bustle preparing for it. I have the prospect and only the prospect of a companion on the way. I recd. a note this Evening from a Capt. of the 34th say[ing] that he had heard that I was going to join and should be very glad of my company as he intended leaving Madras for Jaulnah in a few days. I sent to him instantly & learnt that he goes on bd. ship tomorrow for Musulipatam, so if he can't wait for me this excellent opportunity must be lost, for I am not half ready - however I shall hear more in the morning....... I have not heard a word from Bombay since I left it so am all anxiety to hear from them and from you. I have wrote to Jas desiring him to send a letter to meet me at Hydrabad a place abt. 1/2 way to Jaulnah, wh. if he writes directly may be done very well. I expect a large packet of news. I flattered myself I shd. have been able to remit money to you from here; if I had gone to Batavia I might have done it very well, but am sorry to say that it is quite impossible now - my expenses now are enormous! You will hardly be able to believe me when I tell you they will amount to 150£! I will try to give you some idea of them -- hiring bullocks to carry my baggage, wh. I suppose is the best way, I have reason to believe will amount to abt. 30 £. I think I shall buy a poney or some low-priced horse just to carry me up, as I am told good horses are much cheaper there than here, wh. with a second-hand bridle & saddle will perhaps cost me 20 £. Then I am 40£ in debt - money taken up of paymaster of 84th at Port Louis and here - mess accts. on bd. ship & here, servants wages and things bought at sale of Asst. Surgn's effects that died. The prices of Europe articles here are incredible. I have given 2: 10 for a hat & 8£ for a scarlet coat.....Tavern expenses and Palanquin hire! Do you know it's impossible to walk a hundred yards in this heavenly climate! If you want to go out you must pay 5s a day for being carried on men's shoulders. I hear it will be my best plan to go by sea to Musulipatam (a sea port up the coast) as it cuts off 200 miles of the journey & the expense is very trifling; but it is difficult to meet with conveyances. I will do it if I can. I shall require five or six bullocks to carry my luggage wh. consists of a Tent, 3 Trunks, Table, Chair, Writing Desk, Cot, and Canteen i.e. Box containing my eating, drinking and cooking apparatus. It is customary to travel only frm ten to fifteen miles a day in India - the heat of the climate makes it impossible to do more with comfort as the only time in wh. one can bear to move is from 3 to 7 in the morning. So you see what a precious long jaunt I am to have of it...Two Months at least!

---------30th Was ever poor devil so vexed with difficulties and dilemmas as I am! and so little able to deal with them! I have been laboring harder than a cart-horse ever since I came to town and am at this moment farther from my point than ever! I can't get any money! The paymaster general would not give money without an order - "Where was I to get it?" "From the Auditor Genl. Col. Bruce". Col. Bruce "has no authority to give me an order." It was necessary for me to get the sanction of Governt.! I must apply to Major Tylden, Deputy Adjutt. Genl. or to Col. Agnew, Military secretary to the Comr. in Chief. Major Tylden could do nothing! From Col. Agnew I at last heard something more satisfactory, but how satisfactory! I must write in to him requesting him to make application to the Comr. in Chief for his sanction to enable me to receive so and so ----my petition would be presented on Tuesday and I might think myself fortunate if I got an answer that day --- most likely it would be the end of the week -- well be it so! If by the end of the week or the end of the next week I surmount this mountain of difficulties I shall think myself fortunate and feel a sensible surprize that it has happened at all. What makes my case the harder is that I have four months pay due (abt. 133£) and can't get it!! because, forsooth I have not joined my regiment. Oh! How cordially I could send E[?]-------and all its dependancies to the D---------. Then again this Capt. Carnegie - he is gone off for Musulm. ; he has been so good as to promise to wait for me there 12 days - if I don't join him by that time he will sett off. How very probable it is that this annoying business will detain me longer than that & what a grevious disappointment it would be attended with! Capt. C. is an old traveller in India & is perfectly acquainted with everything relating to travel. He tells me there are the greatest thieves and most daring rascals in the world on the road & that I should be robbed of all I had & may-be my life into the bargain if the greatest precautions were not taken travelling alone and ignorant of everything. However don't let us look only on the dark side of the affair. I have furnished myself with a pair of pistols wh. may stand me in good part. And I know the natives of India are in genl. a set of weak cowardly wretches. Capt. C. recommends me by all means to go by sea to Musulm. & I certainly will if possible wh. is now more likely as I hear of a ship going to sail for there in a few days. I shall put off buying a horse till I get there. And now, d'ye know I am going to make a great boast and praise myself up to the skies; mighty indeed is the task wh. I have accomplished! Can you imagine a greater to one who is blessed with so little brass as I am, to have to call upon, introduce myself face to face, and tell my story to half a dozen great men, one after another, with their long grave phizres [?] . I had rather have walked ten miles even under the burning sun that is now shining in at my window, than have faced one of them! However, from evil cometh good. I find [I] have got a lesson in the school of the world wh. will be of great use to me. I got over it to my no small self-satisfaction.

------April 1st. Prospects brighten a little - my affair seems to be in a fair way and only wants a little patience. I have wrote the letter to Col. Agnew & have had a polite note in return; says he would lay it before the Comr. in Chief tomorrow. I have just heard a little news wh. however I was not quite ignorant of before---Mr Abercrombie the surgeon of the 34th is waiting for my joining to go to England and it seems my absence at the Isle of France cannot have detained him much for the other Asst. S. has been absent frm. the Regt. on a trial here, & indeed has hardly arrived at Jaulnah yet. So that is all well & good. The Senior Asst. surgn. will be put in charge on the surgeon's departure and I of course shall be his head Aid de Camp. I have scraped an acquaintance with a brother stick[?] at the tavern here from whom I have leant all this. I hear of a sailing for Musulm. too, in four or five days, wh. I think will just suit me.

April 3d. I'm in a hopeful way! I've got no money yet nor am I likely to do it - difficulties increase at every step & here I could grumble a whole page to you in the same style but I won't. I am resolved to set the best face I can on the affair, & hope that the next day, or if not the next, the next to that, will do my business. I fully expected to have it concluded this morning, instead of wh. I was told that a certificate of the last pay I had recd. & an extract fm. Genl. Orders & the duce knows what else was necessary. I got them all & sent them in again & am to hear more on Friday, the 5th. I find I can get a passage to Musulm. in four days, so if I can only manage the other affair I shall get on swimmingly. If I am detained longer I purpose sending my baggage & serv. by the ship & go myself in a Palanquin. I can do [it?] in a week but it will cost me 15£ or more! - Perhaps I may meet with another sea conveyance. I will now just astonish your weak minds a little with giving you an acct. of the reasonable charges of the tavern I am living at. In the 1st place my room and bed costs me 3"9 a day - my breakfast 3s. Tiffen or a lunch wh. is always eaten in India abt. 1 or 2 oclock is 3s 9d. and Dinner (at 7 oclock) 7s 6d.! A glass of brandy & water is 15d; a bottle of wine 7s 6d.; or a glass 15d; a bottle of beer 3s 9d. ---- but believe me I don't incur many of these expenses. I make my Tiffen serve me for a dinner & drink very little of this beer or wine.

April 5th. I find misfortunes, like doses of laudanum, lose a great deal of their effect by being gradually increased. When I found today that I had lost my passage to Musulipatam by sea, that I had lost the company of Capt. Carnegie on the road, that I must unavoidably be detained here four or five days longer, running all the time over head and ears in debt ---I say I perceived all these agreeable circumstances with perfect calmness and resignation! And to make the best of a bad bargain, set about forming my plans, and seeking for agreeable ideas from them to drive away those disagreeable ones. I would pack up all [......] directly and send them by the ship. I would buy a horse and go my[..............]; I could get a little poney for my boy for 50s. & he should [.......................] with a couple of clean shirts & some cold meat and bread wh. we would [.................] at every village we came to. I could eat it without either plate or knife & fork; when I had [.........] could fall asleep under a Mangoe Tree. I could get on twenty or five & twenty miles a day very well & so would get to Musulipatam before Capt. Carnegie had left it --- and would not that be better than lying sea sick and half dead with ennui on bd. ship?-----So it is you see, that my enviable disposition can accomodate itself to evils & even change them into good. This is the plan I have formed & wh. I am resolved to put in execution. I have sent my luggage on bd. ship & the day after I have got my money will set off as I have told you.

[The remainder of the letter mainly illegible].