+01 PREFACE

My object in writing this DIARY OF A TOUR THROUGH OUDE was to prepare, for submission to the Government of India, as fair and full a picture of the real state of the country, condition, and feeling of the people of all classes, and character of the Government under which they at present live, as the opportunities which the tour afforded me might enable me to draw.

The DIARY must, for the present, be considered as an official document, which may be perused, but cannot be published, wholly or in part, without the sanction of Government previously obtained.*

W. H. SLEEMAN.
Lucknow, 1852.

  • This permission was accorded by the Honourable Court of Directors in December last.

[Transcriber’s note: Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official by W. H. Sleeman 2nd Ed. 1915, p.xxxvi notes that the date of the permission was not December 1851, but December 1852.]