the country is india.a colonial offcial and his wife are giving a large dinner party.they are seated with theri guests-army officers and government attaches and their wives,and a visiting american naturalist-in their spacous dining room,which has a bare marble floor,open rafters,and wide glass doors opening on toa veranda.a spirited discussion spings up between a yoaung girl who insists that women have outgrown the jumping-on-a-chair-at-the-sight-of-a-mouse era and a colonel who say that they haven't.