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Anyone who strives to rule in India must do so by personal appearance and not paperwork. That is the accepted wisdom handed down from the time of the Khans who, it is said, were pleased to be approached by the most humble of people.
So here I was being, by proxy, the personal appearance of the ruler to the ruled. Audience officially concluded I bowed, deeply, murmured the required words and withdrew seven steps backwards before straightening up and turning away. Such deference might seem to many a trifle extreme, but the times are uncertain and the influence of this court is not to be underestimated. Nor is it's protocol and ceremonial. I have been here two weeks already, meeting with officials, attending gatherings, even observing various religious ceremonies every time immaculately turned out in full dress uniform and with my very finest court manners on show.
To think I once longed to be done with the road and its necessary informality and random events! My quarters here are grand and beautiful, as one would expect for one commissioned to act on behalf of her imperial majesty the empress Victoria but I have come to regard them as a prison cell and to cast longing eyes out over the walls of the palace.
I long, very privately, to be again as free as the clouds which race overhead driven by the monsoon winds. To see the wide open sky instead of just a small square patch directly overhead. Until this afternoons audience with the Maharajah and had thought myself alone in this gilded prison, but now I see in him a fellow prisoner, one who knows he has no hope of parole or escape. One around who the prison bars have closed irrevocably. I ponder the horrors of such a fate as I smile and bow and remember names and ranks amongst the court officials and flatterers and wonder if there is anyway I can help my fellow inmate to escape.
After the whole ceremonial of my presentation the real business can begin, as always, with a banquet at which I am the honored guest. Tedious as I have always found such affairs my position to the right of the Maharajah does present me with the useful requirement of making conversation with him and we cover a wide range of topics as the courses and the entertainments come and go.
I am taking my leave of him at the end of the evening when in a hushed voice he said "Thank you Captain Watson, for granting me a little taste of freedom tonight."
I controlled my face firmly and just as softly replied "Majesty I only wish I could do more in that vein."
A small smile flitted across his face as we both saw the court officials hastening towards us "Ah but Captain if I were free what should I do with such a gift? Some men, and I believe you to be one of them, are strong enough to endure freedom I am not so strong, a week, a month at most and I should be crippled and food for scavengers. Here were I am strong however every tale of freedom is a moment of ecstasy and fuel to the tides of change."
I bowed low in acknowledgment of the truth he had granted me, "Your majesty forgive my boldness but in my view a man may never know of what endurance he his capable until he is tested."
My host pondered a long moment as aghast courtiers hovered and then replied, "Should it ever come to pass Captain I shall hope to prove your words true."
I left his court a week later on the road that would eventually lead to my own proving ground, and I heard no more of him but his son many years later would indeed prove, under the worst of trials, that a man of principles and courage can indeed endure any hardship.