Partly By Natural Temperament, But Also Certainly By Severe
Self-Discipline, His Manner Was Invincibly Placid And His Temper
Imperturbable.[45] Yet None Was More Tenacious In Maintaining Whatever He
Judged Right.
Baker, whilst large-minded in great matters, was extremely conventional in
small ones, and Yule must sometimes have tried his feelings in this
respect.
The particulars of one such tragic occurrence have survived.
Yule, who was colour-blind,[46] and in early life whimsically obstinate in
maintaining his own view of colours, had selected some cloth for trousers
undeterred by his tailor's timid remonstrance of "Not quite your usual
taste, sir." The result was that the Under-Secretary to Government
startled official Calcutta by appearing in brilliant claret-coloured
raiment. Baker remonstrated: "Claret-colour! Nonsense, my trousers are
silver grey," said Yule, and entirely declined to be convinced. "I think I
did convince him at last," said Baker with some pride, when long after
telling the story to the present writer. "And then he gave them up?"
"Oh, no," said Sir William ruefully, "he wore those claret-coloured
trousers to the very end." That episode probably belonged to the Dalhousie
period.
When Yule resumed work in the Secretariat at Calcutta at the close of the
Mutiny, the inevitable arrears of work were enormous. This may be the
proper place to notice more fully his action with respect to the choice of
gauge for Indian railways already adverted to in brief. As we have seen,
his own convictions led to the adoption of the metre gauge over a great
part of India.
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