Roving East and Roving West | Page 9

that the enemy was within a foot of them. On went the hawk, in its
terrible, cruel onset, and up came the ducks, all ready to repeat these
tactics when it turned and attacked again. But on one of the party (I
swear it was not I), in order to assist the hawk, firing his gun, two of
the ducks became panic-stricken and left the water, only of course to be
quickly destroyed. It was on the hawk's return journey to the pond to
make sure of the third duck that I saw for the first time in my life-- and
I hope the last--the expression on the countenance of these terrible birds
in the execution of their duty: more than the mere execution of duty,
the determination to have no more nonsense, to put an end to anything
so monstrous as self-protection in others; for my horse being directly in
the way, he flew under its neck and for a moment I thought that he was
confusing me with the desired mallard. Nothing more merciless or
purposeful did I ever see.

Then began a really heroic struggle on the part of the victim. He timed
his dives to perfection, and escaped so often that the spirit of chivalry
would have decreed a truce. But blood had been tasted, and, the desire
being for more, the guns were again discharged. Not even they,
however, could divert the duck from his intention of saving his life, and
he dived away from the shot, too.
It was at this moment that assistance to the gallant little bird
arrived--not from man, who was past all decency, but from brother
feathers. Out of a clear sky suddenly appeared two tern, dazzling in
their whiteness, and these did all in their power to infuriate the hawk
and lure him from the water. They flew round him and over him; they
called him names; they said he was a bully and that all of us (which
was true) ought to be ashamed of ourselves; they daunted and
challenged and attacked. But the enemy was too strong for them. A
fusillade drove them off, and once again we were free to consider the
case of the duck, who was still swimming anxiously about, hoping
against hope. More shots were fired, one of the boys waded in with a
stick, and the dogs were added to the assault; and in the face of so
determined a bombardment the poor little creature at last flew up, to be
struck down within a few seconds by the insatiable avenger.
That was the crowning event of the afternoon. Thereafter we had only
small successes, and some very pronounced failures when, as happened
several times, a bird flew for safety through a tree, and the hawk,
following, was held up amid the branches. One of the birds thus to
escape was a blue jay of brilliant beauty. We also got some hares. And
then we loitered back under the yellowing sky, and Sir Umar Hayat
Khan ceased suddenly to be a foe of fur and feathers and became a poet,
talking of sunsets in India and in England as though the appreciation of
tender beauty were his only delight.

NEW, OR IMPERIAL, DELHI
There have been seven Delhis; and it required no little courage to
establish a new one--the Imperial capital--actually within sight of most

of them; but the courage was forthcoming. Originally the position was
to be to the north of the present city, where the Coronation Durbar
spread its canvas, but Raisina was found to be healthier, and it is there,
some five miles to the south-west, that the new palaces are rising from
the rock. Fatehpur-Sikri is the only city with which the New Delhi can
be compared; but not Akbar himself could devise it on a nobler scale.
Akbar's centralising gift and Napoleon's spacious views may be said to
combine here, the long avenues having kinship with the Champs
Elysées, and Government House and the Secretariat on the great rocky
plateau at Raisina corresponding to the palace on Fatehpur-Sikri's
highest point. The splendour and the imagination which designed the
lay-out of Imperial Delhi cannot be over-praised, and under the hands
of Sir Edwin Lutyens and Mr. Herbert Baker some wonderful buildings
are coming to life. The city, since it is several square miles in extent,
cannot be finished for some years, but it may be ready to be the seat of
Government as soon as 1924.
As I have said, the old Delhis are all about the new one. On the Grand
Trunk road out of Delhi proper, which goes to Muttra and Agra, you
pass, very quickly, on the left, the remains of Firozabad, the capital of
Firoz Shah in the later thirteenth century. Two or three miles