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By Root 1299 0

lives on the floor below. He has been everywhere and speaks more languages than the best of dubashes. A man more imposing in presence and more pleasing in address I do not think I have ever met (… and no, my dear Marquise de Puggladour, just in case you are tempted to speculate, he is not the One – he is old enough to be my father and seems to be possessed of paltans of children). He reminds me a little of our Calcutta Armenians: he grew up in Cairo and learnt watchmaking from a Frenchman who went to Egypt with Napoleon (you may not credit it but Mr Karabedian has actually met the Bonaparte!). He describes himself as a ‘Sing-song Man’ – because he trades in watches, clocks and music-boxes which are all spoken of as ‘sing-songs’ in the Canton jargon. Such is the demand for them that Mr Karabedian is able to sell his best musical clocks for thousands of dollars (one has even been sent to the Emperor, in Peking!). After he has sold all his foreign sing-songs Mr Karabedian buys a great quantity of locally made clocks and watches – they are perfectly serviceable and produced at such little cost that he is able to sell them for a handsome profit in India and Egypt.

Mr Karabedian has been coming to Canton for a very long time and knows all the gup-shup – which tai-pans are at odds with each other, who is befriending whom, and which sets of people you cannot invite to dinner together (and yes, my dear Puggly, even in this tiny place there are many Sets and Cliques and Factions). There are even Royals of a sort, or at least there is an uncrowned King: he is Mr William Jardine, a great Nabob of Scottish origin. He is a personable man, tall, and, considering that he is in his mid-fifties, surprisingly youthful in appearance. Mr Chinnery has painted a portrait of him which is much celebrated: I confess I admired it too, at least until I saw Mr Jardine in the flesh. Now it seems to me that Mr Chinnery flattered him more than a little. If I were to paint Mr Jardine I would do it in the manner of the Velázquez portraits of Phillip the Fourth of Spain. Mr Jardine has an equally smooth and glowing face, and there is in his gaze the same certainty of power, the same self-satisfaction. Mr Karabedian says he came to Canton as a doctor but grew tired of medicine and went into the Trade instead. He has made millions through it, mainly by selling opium – he is so industrious he keeps no chair in his office for fear of encouraging idle prattle and slothfulness. His company is called Jardine & Matheson, but his partner is an unremarkable man and Mr Jardine is rarely seen with him: when he walks abroad it is almost always in the company of his Friend – one Mr Wetmore who is Fanqui-town’s great dandy, always exquisitely dressed. You should see how people scatter before them when they take their turns around the Maidan: there is so much salaaming and hat-raising that you would think Mr Jardine was the Grand Turk, out for a stroll with his most beloved BeeBee. Mr Jardine and Mr Wetmore are ever so solicitous with each other and Mr Karabedian says that at Balls (and yes, there are many of those in Fanqui-town) they always reserve the waltzes and polkas for each other, even though everyone clamours for their hands. But this touching attachment may alas be nearing its end. Zadig Bey says that Mr Jardine is soon to make the ‘ultimate sacrifice’, by which is meant, leaving Canton and moving to England to get married. Mr Jardine is most reluctant to do this, not only because of his Friend but also because he has spent much of his life in the East and is deeply attached to it.

As you know, Puggly dear, nothing is of interest to me if I cannot see and paint it. I had never imagined that politics would ever fall into that class of things – but in listening to Mr Karabedian I have begun to conceive of an epic painting: it is a delicious thought for I could include in it many details from the gallery of pictures I carry around in my head. Just think of it! In Mr Jardine I have already found a window through which I can smuggle in a small touch of Velázquez;