Adventures of Maheput Sing of Bhowaneepoor–Advantages of a good road from Lucknow to Fyzabad–Excellent condition of the artillery bullocks with the Frontier Police–Get all that Government allows for them–Bred in the Tarae–Dacoits of Soorujpoor Bareyla–The Amil connives at all their depredations, and thrives in consequence–The Amil of the adjoining districts does not, and ruined in consequence– His weakness–Seetaram, a capitalist–His account of a singular Suttee–Bukhtawar Sing’s notions of Suttee, and of the reason why Rajpoot widows seldom become Suttees–Why local authorities carry about prisoners with them–Condition of prisoners–No taxes on mango- trees–Cow-dung cheaper than wood for fuel–Shrine of “Shaikh Salar” at Sutrik–Bridge over the small river Rete–Recollection of the ascent of a balloon at Lucknow–End of the pilgrimage.
Poorae Chowdheree, of Kuchohee, held a share in the lands of the village of Bhanpoor in Radowlee. He mortgaged it in 1830, to a co- sharer, who transferred the mortgage to Meherban Sing, of Guneshpoor. Poorae disliked the arrangement, and made all the cultivators desert the village of Bhanpoor, and leave the lands waste. Meherban attacked the village of Kuchohee in consequence, killed Porae, and seized upon all the lands of Bhanpoor for himself. Rajah Ram, one of the ousted co-sharers in these lands, attacked and killed Meherban in 1832, and seized upon all the lands of Bhanpoor.
After the death of his first wife, Meherban had attacked the house of Bhowanee Sing, Rajpoot, of Teur, carried off his daughter, who had been affianced to another, and forcibly made her his wife. By her he had one daughter and one son, named Maheput Sing, who now inherited from his father a fifteenth part of one of the six and half shares into which the lands of Guneshpoor were divided. He, by degrees, murdered, or drove out of the village, all his co-sharers, save Gunbha Sing and Chungha Sing, joint proprietors of a small part of one of the shares, known by the name of the Kunnee Puttee. From the year 1843, Maheput Sing became a robber by profession, and the leader of a formidable gang; and in three years, by a long series of successful enterprises, he acquired the means of converting his residence, on the border of the town of Guneshpoor, into a strong fort, among the deep ravines of the Goomtee river. This fort he called Bhowaneegur, after Bhowanee, the patroness of the trade of murder and robbery, which he had adopted.
I shall now mention, more circumstantially, a few of the many atrocities committed by him and his gang, during the last few years of his career, as illustrative of the state of society in Oude. Bulbhudder Sing, a subadar of the 45th Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry, resided at Rampoor Sobeha, in the Dureeabad district. By degrees he purchased thirteen-sixteenths of the lands of these two small villages, which adjoin each other, out of the savings from his pay, and those of his nephew, Mugun Sing, havildar of the 43rd Regiment Bengal Native Infantry. On his being transferred to the invalid establishment, the subadar resided with his family in Rampoor, and in May, 1846, his nephew, Mugun Sing, came home on furlough to visit him. Gujraj, an associate of Maheput Sing’s, held the other three-sixteenths of the lands of these two villages; and by the murder of the subadar and all his family, he thought he should be able to secure for himself the possession of the whole estate in perpetuity. The family consisted of the subadar and his wife,–Mugun Sing, the son of his deceased brother, Man Sing, and his wife; and his son Bijonath and his wife,–Dwarka Sing, son of Ojagur Sing, another deceased brother of the subadar,–Mahta Deen, the son of Chundun Sing, another deceased brother of the subadar, and his wife and young son, Surubjeet Sing, seven years of age,–Kulotee Sing, son of Gobrae, another deceased brother of the subadar,–Bag Sing, a relative,–Bechun Sing, a servant,–Seo Deen, the gardener,–Jeeawun Sing, the barber, and the widow of Salwunt Sing, another son of Mugun Sing, havildar.
When the family were all assembled, Maheput Sing, with Gujraj and other associates, and a gang of one hundred and fifty armed followers, proceeded to the village at midnight, and carefully reconnoitred the premises. It was, after consultation, determined to defer the attack till daybreak, as the subadar and his nephews were known to be brave and well-armed men, who kept watch till towards morning, and would make a desperate resistance, unless taken by surprise. They remained concealed within the enclosure of Gujraj’s house, till just before daylight, when they quietly surrounded the subadar’s house. As day dawned the subadar got up, opened the door and walked out, as usual, to breathe the fresh air, thinking all safe. He was immediately shot down, and on Mugun Sing’s rushing out to assist his uncle, he received a shot in the eye, and fell dead on his body. The robbers then rushed in, cut down Jeeawun, the barber, while attempting to shut the door, and wounded Kulotee Sing,* Bag Sing, and others of the party. Finding that they could no longer stand against the numbers, rushing in at the doors and windows, the defenders climbed from the inside to the flat roof of the house, over the apartments of the men, fired down upon the robbers, who were still inside, and shot one of them. The robbers, finding they could not otherwise dislodge them, set fire to that part of the house, and the men were obliged to leap off to save themselves. In doing this, Bag Sing hurt his spine, and Seo Deen sprained his ankle, and both lay where they fell, pretending to be dead, till night. The others all went off in search of succour.
[* Kulotee Sing was murdered, a few days afterwards, by Maheput and Gujraj, as he was superintending the cultivation of his lands.]
The robbers found the boy, Surubjeet, lying sick on his bed, attended by his mother. They seized him and dashed his head against the ground; and when he still showed signs of life, Gujraj cut him to pieces with his sword. They then seized and stripped the females naked, and sprinkled boiling oil over their bodies, till they pointed out all the property concealed in the house. Seventeen hundred rupees were found buried in the floor; and the rest of the property in clothes, gold and silver ornaments, and brass utensils, amounted to about ten thousand rupees.
About noon, while the robbers were still in the house, the Amil of Mohlara came with a large force and one gun, and surrounded them; but stood at a safe distance, whence he kept up for some time a fire from his gun and his matchlocks, which had no effect whatever. The robbers fired in return from the house, merely to show that they were not to be frightened from their booty in that way. This went on till after dark in the evening, when the robbers all retired to the jungles with their booty, unmolested by the Amil.
Byjonath, who had brought the Amil to the spot, urged him on as much as he could to save the property and females, and avenge the death of those who had fallen, and he killed one man and seized another, the son of one of the leaders; but he was obliged to give him up to the Amil as an hostage, for the recovery of the property, and a witness to the robbery. The Amil kept him for six months, and then let him go on the largest ransom he could get for him from his father. The circumstances were all represented, through the Resident, to the Durbar, and redress prayed for, but none was ever obtained.*
[* When the Resident visited this place, in his tour, in January, 1850, Dwarka Sing and other members of the family described all the circumstances of this attack, and they were taken down; and have been confirmed since by a judicial investigation.]
In May 1846, Maheput attacked the house of Seobuksh, a gardener, and after plundering it, he seized and carried off to the jungle the gardener’s brother, Puroutee, and tortured him to death with hot irons, because he could not raise the sum demanded for his ransom.
In August 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of Meherban Tewaree, subadar of the Gwalior Contingent, in the village of Hareehurpoor, in the district of Rodowlee. It was about ten at night, and the whole family were asleep. The subadar lay on his cot below, near the door, his brother, Angud Tewaree, slept on the upper story. Some placed ladders and entered the upper story through a window; Maheput, with others, broke open the door, near which the subadar slept below. The brother got a sword-cut in the hand, and called out from the upper story as loud as he could for help; but their neighbours were all too much alarmed to come to their aid. Maheput seized and bound the subadar with his own waistband, and commanded his brother to come down, saying, that he need not call for help, as the villagers all knew him too well to molest him; and if he did not come down instantly he would set fire to the house. Seeing no chance of help, he came down, and was bound with his own waistband in the same manner. When the subadar remonstrated against this treatment, Maheput struck him over the face. They then plundered the house of all the property it contained, to the value of six hundred and fifty rupees; and took the subadar and his brother to the jungles; and, in the morning, demanded a ransom of one thousand rupees. At last they came down to four hundred rupees and the horse, which the subadar kept for his own riding. The subadar consented, and his brother was released to get the money and horse. He borrowed the money and sent it with the horse through Bhowanee Deen Tewaree, landholder of Ladeeka Poorwa, and the subadar was released. He presented three petitions, through the Resident, and orders were sent from the Durbar to the local authorities, Hurdut Sing and Monna Lal, but they were both in league with the robbers, and tried to get the subadar made away with, to save further trouble, and he sought security with his regiment.*
[* Meherban Tewaree, subadar, was present, as a witness at the subsequent trial of Maheput and Gujraj, who were sentenced to transportation beyond seas for life.]
In January 1847, Maheput and his gang attacked the village of Bahapoor, in the Rodowlee district; and after plundering all the houses, seized and carried off among others Seetul, the spirit- dealer, and the two sons of Reehta, the widow of Bhosoo, one twenty- two years of age, and the other eighteen. They tortured them with red-hot irons, and tied bamboos round their necks every day for fifteen days. Maheput then shot the eldest son, and cut his body to pieces with his sword. The younger son, at night, made his escape while they were asleep, and returned to tell the tale of his brother’s murder to his mother. Seetul, the Kalwar, got his uncle to lend him twenty-eight rupees, for which he was released.
In April 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of Ramoutar, Brahmin, of the Brahmin village of Guneshpoor, in Rodowlee; plundered it of properly valued at one hundred rupees, and then bound Ramoutar, his father and two sons, and took them off to the jungles; and there tortured them all for seven days. He then had the two boys, one nine years old and the other five, suspended to a tree and flogged; and Ramoutar himself tied to a thorny tree and beaten till the blood flowed down and drenched his waistband, because he could pay nothing, and would not sign a bond to pay two thousand rupees. His sufferings and the sight of those of his two sons made him at last sign one for one thousand rupees. He was flogged again till his friends brought four hundred out of the thousand, and Cheyt Sing, Thakoor, a respectable landholder of Koleea, in Rodowlee, consented to give security for the payment of two hundred and forty-two rupees more. Ramoutar and his family were then released, after they had been confined and tortured for thirty-six days, and they went off and resided at Bookcheyna in Khundasa. A year after his house was there attacked by Maheput Sing and his gang, and plundered of all it contained; and his brother Seetul, and his youngest son were seized and taken off to his fort at Bhowaneegur, and there tortured and starved for six months. Ramoutar then borrowed one hundred and sixty rupees, and obtained the release of his brother Seetul, and a year after he was able to raise forty-seven rupees more, with which he ransomed his son.
In May 1847, Maheput Sing attacked the house of Seolal Tewaree of Torsompoor, in Rodowlee, at midnight; and after plundering it and stripping his mother and wife, and the wife of his brother, Jurbundun Sing, of all the clothes and ornaments they had, he bound and carried off to the jungle the two brothers, Seolal and Jurbundun. They were flogged, and had hot irons applied to their bodies every day for twenty days, and had only a little flour to eat and water to drink, once in three days. After twenty days they contrived to make their escape one dark and stormy night, and got home; but three days after he again attacked their house and burnt it to the ground, with all they possessed. He, at the same time, burnt down the house of their uncle, in the same village, and that of one of their ploughmen; and two cows and one bullock were burnt to death in the flames.
In July 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of Chubbee Lal, Brahmin, in the village of Bunnee, in the Rodowlee district, and after plundering it of property to the value of five hundred rupees, he bound and took the old Brahmin off to the jungles, and demanded from him a ransom of eight thousand rupees. This sum the old man could not pay, and he was flogged with thorns, and had red-hot irons applied to his body every day. Maheput then sent a letter to the old man’s son, Dwarka, desiring him to send the eight thousand rupees if he wished his father to live. The house having been plundered, the family had nothing left, and could persuade no one to lend them. On receiving a reply to this effect, Maheput had the old man’s body plastered all over with moist gunpowder, and made him stand in the sun till it was dry. He then set fire to the powder, and the poor man was burnt all over. He then cut off both his hands at the wrists, and his nose, and sent them to his family, and in this condition be afterwards sent the poor man to his home upon a cot. The son met his father at the door, but the old man died as soon as his son had embraced him.
Maheput carried off Pem, the son of Teeka, at the same time, and tortured him till his family paid the ransom demanded. He was witness to the tortures of the old Brahmin.
In August 1847, Maheput and his gang attacked the house of Bichook, a Brahmin, in the village of Torsompoor, in Rodowlee, at midnight, while he was sleeping, and bound and carried him off to the jungle. The next day, when he was about to have him tortured for a ransom, one of his followers interceded for him, and he was released. But a month after, Maheput and his gang again attacked his house, and after plundering it of all it contained, they burnt it to the ground. Bichook had run off on hearing their approach, and he escaped to Syudpoor.
In November, 1846, Maheput Sing attacked the house of Sook Allee, in Guneshpoor, at midnight, with a gang of one hundred men; and, after plundering it of all the property it contained, to the amount of four hundred rupees, he burnt it to the ground, and bound and carried off Sook Allee to the house of his friend, Byjonath Bilwar, a landholder in the village of Kholee, eight miles distant. He there demanded a ransom of five hundred rupees; and on his declaring that he neither had nor could borrow such a sum, he had him tortured with hot irons, and flogged in the usual way. He kept him for two months at Kholee, and then took him to Tukra, in the Soorajpoor purgunnah, where he kept him for another month, torturing, and giving him half a meal every other day. At the end of three months, Akber Sing and Bhowanee Deen, Rajpoot landholders of Odemow, contrived to borrow two hundred rupees for Sook Allee, and he was released on the payment of this sum. The marks of the hot irons, applied to his body by Maheput Sing, with his own hands, are still visible, and will remain so as long as he lives.*
[* I saw these marks on the sufferer.]
About the same time–the latter end of 1846–Maheput Sing sent to Sheik Sobratee, of the same place, a message through a pausee, named Bhowanee Deen, demanding twenty-five rupees. This sum was sent; but six weeks had not elapsed, before Sheik Sobratee received another demand for the same amount, through the same person. He had no money, but promised to send the sum in ten days. At midnight, on the fourth day after this, Maheput and his gang attacked his house, and plundered it of all they could find, female ornaments, and clothes, and brass utensils. Sobratee was that night sleeping at the house of his friend Peree, the wood-dealer, in the same town. Maheput tried to make his mother and wife point out where he was, by torturing them, but they either would not or could not do so. After some search, however, they discovered him, and bound and took him off, with handcuffs, and an iron collar round his neck, to the Kurseea jungle, in the Hydergur pergunnah. His son, a boy, had escaped. After torturing him in the usual way for eight days, they sent a message to his mother by Maheput’s servant, Salar, to say, that unless she sent a ransom of five hundred rupees, her son’s nose and hands should be cut off and sent to her as those of Chubbee Lal, Brahmin, of Bunnee, had been. She prevailed upon Baroonath Gotum to lend the money; and Maheput sent Sobratee to him, accompanied by one of his armed retainers, with orders to make him over to the Gotum, if he pledged himself in due form to pay. He did so, and Sobratee was made over to him, and the next day sent home to his wife and mother. Some months after, however, when he had completed his fort of Bhowneegur, Maheput sent to demand two hundred rupees more from Sobratee, and when he found he could not pay, he had his house pulled, down, and took away all the materials to his fort. What he did not require he caused to be burnt. He got from Sobratee, in ransom and plunder, more than three thousand rupees; and he has been ever since reduced to great poverty and distress.
In November 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang seized and carried off Khosal, a confectioner, of Talgon, in Rodowlee, who had gone to his sister at Buhapoor, near Guneshpoor, to attend a marriage–took him to the jungle, and tortured and starved him in the usual way for five weeks. He had him burnt with red-hot irons, flogged and ducked in a tank every day, and demanded a ransom of two hundred rupees. At last, his brother, Davey Deen, borrowed thirty-three rupees from Rambuksh, a merchant of Odermow, and offered to pay it for his ransom. Maheput sent Khosal, with his agent, Bhowanee Deen, to Rambuksh, and he released him on getting the money. He still bears on his body the marks of the stripes and burnings.*
[* These marks I have seen.]
In December 1847, Maheput and his gang attacked the house of Motee Lal Misser, a Brahmin, in the village of——, and after robbing it of all that it contained, he seized and carried off his nephew, Ram Deen, a boy of seven years of age, and tortured him for a month in the jungle. He then cut off his left ear and the forefinger of his right hand, and sent them to the uncle in a letter, stating, that if he did not send him one thousand rupees, he would send the boy’s head in the same manner. The boy’s father had died, and his uncle, with great difficulty, prevailed upon his friends and neighbours to lend him two hundred and twenty rupees, which he sent to Maheput, and his nephew was released. The boy declares to me that Maheput cut off his ear and finger with his own hands.*
[* This boy was present, as a witness, at the trial of Maheput.]
In June 1848, Forsut Pandee, of Resalpandee-ka-Poorwa, in Rodowlee, accompanied Girwar Sing, a Rajpoot of Bowra, in Rodowlee, to Guneshpoor, on some business. They were smoking and talking together at the house of Mungul Sing, Thakoor, a large landholder of that place, when five of Maheput’s armed men came up, and told Forsut Pandee to attend them to their master. Girwar Sing remonstrated and declared that his honour had been pledged for Forsut Pandee’s personal safety. Mungul Sing, Thakoor, however, told him, that he must offer no opposition, as they seized all travellers who came that way, and it was dangerous to oppose them. He was taken to Maheput Sing, in his fort at Bhowaneegur, situated half a mile from Guneshpoor. Maheput told him that he had heard of his having a good flint gun, and a shawl in his house, and that he must have them. Forsut Pandee swore on the Ganges that he had no such things. He then had him tied up to a tree and flogged him with his own hands with thorny bushes, the scars of which are still visible. He then demanded a ransom of three hundred rupees, and had him flogged and tortured every day for a month, while he gave him to eat only half a pound of flour every two or three days. The prisoner’s brother, Bhoree Pandee, sold all the clothes and ornaments of his family, utensils, and furniture, and their hereditary mango and mhowa grove, and raised two hundred and six rupees, which he sent to Maheput, through Baldan Sing, a landholder of Bharatpoor, two miles from Guneshpoor. On the receipt of this Forsut Pandee was released.
In October 1848, Maheput Sing sent ten of his gang to seize a cultivator, by name Khosal, who was engaged in cultivating his land in a hamlet, one mile south of the town of Syudpoor. They seized and bound him and took him off to their leader, Maheput, who had him tortured for a month in the usual way. He had him tied up to a ladder and flogged. He had red-hot irons applied to different parts of his body–he put dry combustibles on the open palms of his hands and set fire to them, so that he has lost the use of his fingers for life. For the whole month he gave him only ten pounds of flour to eat; but his friends contrived to convey a little more to him occasionally, which he ate by stealth. He was reduced, by hunger and torture, to the last stage, when his family, by the sale of all they had in the world, and the compassion of their friends, raised the sum of one hundred and twenty-six rupees, which they sent to Maheput, by Thakoor Persaud, a landholder of the village of Somba, and obtained his release. The tortures have rendered him a cripple, and the family are reduced to a state of great wretchedness.*
[* This man was a witness at the trial of Maheput, and I saw the signs of his sufferings.]
The village of Guneshpoor yielded a revenue to Government of twenty- one thousand rupees a-year, and was divided into six and half shares each, held by a different person. One belonged to Omrow Sing, Rajpoot, the father of Hunmunt Sing, a corporal in the 44th Regiment Bengal Native Infantry, and descended to Omrow Sing’s eldest son, Davey Sing. One share was held, jointly, by Maheput Sing and Chotee Sing, when, in October 1848, Maheput assembled a gang of about two hundred men, and attacked the house of Davey Sing, while his brother Hunmunt Sing was at home on recruiting service. There were in the house the corporal and his three brothers, and all mounted, with their friends, to the top of the house, with their swords and spears, but without fire-arms. The robbers, unable to ascend from the outside, broke open the doors, but the brothers descended and defended the passage so resolutely, that the gang was obliged to retire and watch for a better opportunity.
Three months after, in January 1849, Maheput attacked the house again, with a gang of five hundred men and good scaling-ladders. Some ascended to the top on the ladders, while others broke open the doors and forced their way in. The brothers and the other male members of the family defended themselves resolutely. One of the brothers, Esuree Sing, his uncle, Runjeet Sing, sipahee of the 11th Regiment Bengal Native Infantry, his cousin, Beetul Sing, sipahee of the 8th Regiment Bombay Native Infantry, were all killed, and hacked to pieces by Maheput and his gang. No person came to the assistance of the family, and the robbers retired with their booty, consisting of five hundred and ten rupees in money, four muskets, and four swords, and twelve hundred maunds of corn, and all the clothes, ornaments, and utensils that could be found. They burnt down the house, and dispossessed the family of their share in the estate, and plundered all the cultivators. Davey Sine the eldest brother, went to reside at Bhanpoor, in the neighbourhood. While he was engaged in cutting a field of pulse, in the morning, about seven o’clock, in the month of March following, Maheput Sing, with a gang of two hundred men, attacked his house, killed his two brothers, Gordut and Hurdut Sing, and their servant, Omed, and shot down his nephew, Gorbuksh Sing. Ramsahae, the nephew of Maheput Sing, ran up to despatch him with his sword, but Gorbuksh rose, cut him down, and killed him with his sword before he himself expired.
The corporal, Hunmunt Sing, of the 44th Native Infantry, described all these things in several petitions to the Resident, and prayed redress, but no redress was ever obtained. Saligram and other relatives of the corporal had been plundered and wounded by Maheput Sing and his gang, and he describes many other atrocities committed by the same gang. His petition of the 27th September 1849, was sent to the King by the Resident, who was told, that the Amil of the district of Dureeabad, Girdhara Lal, had been ordered to seize Maheput Sing and his gang. This Amil was always in league with them.
In December 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of a female, named Arganee, the widow of Sheik Rozae, in the village of Pertab Pahae. It was midnight, and she was sleeping with her two grandchildren, the sons of her son, who was a sipahee in the 66th Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry. They bound her hands: and leaving her young grandchildren alone, took her off to the jungle eight miles distant. There Maheput demanded from her the seven hundred rupees which she was said to have accumulated; and when she pleaded poverty, and said that the sipahee’s pay was their only means of subsistence, he had her stripped naked and flogged in the usual way. For a month he had her stripped and flogged in the same manner every day. She then signed a bond to pay one hundred rupees on a certain day, and was released. She sold all she had, and borrowed all she could, and on the fourth day sent him fifty, and the other fifty on the fifteenth day; but he afterwards had the poor widow’s house pulled down and all the wood-work carried to his fort of Bhowaneegur.
In April 1849, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of Seodeen Misser, sipahee of the 63rd Regiment Bengal Native Infantry; and after plundering it, seized and carried off to the jungle his brother and that brother’s two sons–one seven years of age and the other five–and his sister. He sold the two boys as slaves for two hundred rupees to a person named Davey Sookul, of Guneshpoor; and tortured the brother and sister till the sipahee and his friends sold all they had in the world for their ransom, when he released them.
In the month of May 1849, Maheput Sing and his gang at midnight attacked the house of Eseree Sing, a Rajpoot of the Chouhan tribe, in the village of Salpoor, in Dureeabad; and after stripping his mother and all the other females of the family of their clothes and ornaments, plundering the house of all it contained, rupees, twenty- five in money, two handsome matchlocks, two swords, two spears, and two shields, and brass utensils, weighing one hundred and sixty pounds, he bound Eseree Sing himself, and took him off with his sister, four years of age, and his daughter, only three, to a jungle, four miles distant. He there released Eseree Sing himself, but took on the girls, and made over his daughter to Akber, one of his followers, and his sister to Bechoo, another of his gang, to be united to them in marriage. It was at their instigation, and for that purpose chiefly, that he made the attack.*
[* Akber and Bechoo are now in prison, with Maheput, at Lucknow.]
In August 1849, Maheput and his gang attacked the houses of Seetul, Gorbuksh, and Sook Lal, Brahmins, of Guneshpoor; and after plundering them, he carried off Gorbuksh and his son, Ram Deen, and Bhowanee, the son of Seetul, and Sook Lal, and murdered them. He carried off and tortured, in a shocking manner, Benee, of the same place, till he paid a ransom; and Ongud, son of Khunmun, an invalid Khalasie, of the 26th Regiment Native Infantry.
In September 1849, Maheput attacked and plundered the house of Ongud Sing, sipahee of the 24th Regiment Bengal Native Infantry, and confined the sipahee for some time. His petition was sent to the King on the 11th November 1849.
On the 15th of December 1849, Monowur Khan, havildar of the 62nd Regiment Bengal Native Infantry, complained that Maheput Sing had seized him as he was walking on the high road, and extorted eleven rupees from him. His petition was sent to the King, with a request, that all local authorities might be urged to aid in his arrest; and orders were again sent to the Frontier Police.
On the 24th December 1849, Madho Sing, sipahee of the 11th Regiment Bengal Native Infantry, complained that Maheput Sing had attacked and plundered his house twice, burnt it down, and cut down all the trees which the family had planted for generations, and turned them all out of the village–that in the second attack he had murdered his daughter, a girl of only nine years of age. His petition was sent to the King, who, on the 13th of February 1850, replied that he had proclaimed Maheput as a robber and murderer, and offered a reward of three thousand rupees for his arrest.
On the 16th of March 1850, Goverdhun complained, that Maheput had attacked and plundered his house, and carried off his father to the jungles, and extorted from him a ransom of one hundred and ten rupees. His petition was sent to the King, who, on the 27th March, replied, that he had given frequent and urgent orders for the arrest of Maheput Sing.
Gunga Deen, a trooper of the Governor-General’s body-guard, complained to the Resident, on the 9th of August 1844, that Maheput Sing had attacked and killed with his own hand his agent, Thakoor Sing, while he was taking seven hundred and seventy-four rupees to the revenue-collector. On the 11th of September 1849, he again complained to the Resident, that Maheput Sing had plundered Bhurteemow and other villages, in Dureeabad, of property to the value of six thousand seven hundred and fifty-nine rupees, and murdered five men, besides Thakoor Sing, his servant, and had committed numerous robberies in other villages during the year 1848. Among them one in Bhurteemow, in which he killed Ramjeet and four other men– that he had soon after committed a robbery in which no less than twenty-two persons were killed and wounded, and property to the value of two thousand rupees was carried off. The King was frequently pressed most earnestly to arrest this atrocious robber; and on the 9th of December 1849, the Frontier Police was, at the Kings request, directed to do all in their power to seize him.
In July 1847, Maheput Sing and his gang attacked the house of Mungul Sookul, a corporal of the 24th Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry, at midnight, robbed it of property to the value of five hundred rupees, and so rent the ears of his little son, by the violence with which he tore the gold rings from them, that the boy was not likely to live. The commanding officer of the regiment sent the corporal’s petition for redress, through the Resident, to the Durbar; and orders were sent to the local authorities to afford it, but they were unable or unwilling to do anything.
Gunga Aheer, of Buroulee, in the district of Rodowlee, had been for three years a sipahee in the 48th Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry, under the name of Mata Deen. Continued sickness rendered him unfit for duty, and he obtained his discharge, and came home to his family. In March 1850, having been long without employment, and reduced, with his family, to great distress, he went to his relation, Ramdhun, of the Intelligence Department, in the service of the King of Oude, and then; on duty at Dureeabad, with the Amil. A reward of three thousand rupees having been offered by the King for the arrest of Maheput Sing, the Amil ordered Ramdhun to try his best to trace him out, and he took Gunga Aheer with him to assist, on a promise of securing for him good service if they succeeded. They went to a jungle, about two miles from Guneshpoor, and near the foot of Bhowaneegur. While they were resting at a temple in the jungle, sacred to Davey, Maheput came up, with twenty followers, to offer sacrifice; and as soon as they recognized the Harkara, Ramdhun, they seized both, and took them off in the evening to a jungle, four miles distant. In the hope of frightening Maheput, the Harkara pretended to be in the service of the Resident at Lucknow; but as the reward for his arrest had been offered on the requisition of the Resident, on the application of injured sipahees of the British army, this did not avail him. Their hands were tied behind their backs, and as soon as it became dark, they took Ramdhun off to a distance of twenty paces from where Maheput Sing sat, and made him stand in a circle of men with drawn swords. One man advanced, and at one cut with his sword, severed his right arm from his body, and it fell to the ground. Another cut into the side, under the stump, while a third cut him across the left side of the neck with a back cut, he all the time calling out for mercy, but in vain. On receiving the cut across the neck he fell dead, and the body was flung into the river Goomtee. Maheput sat looking on without saying a word.
They then amused themselves for some time by flogging Gunga Aheer with thorn bushes, while he in agony cried for mercy. The next day, by Maheput’s orders, they laid him upon a bed of thorns and beat him again, while he screamed from pain, and they laughed at his cries. One of the followers told Maheput, that they had been cautioned by the outlaw, Jugurnath, the chuprassie, not to murder Ramdhun and his companion, or the English would some day avenge them; but he laughed and said that spies must be punished, to deter others from pursuing them. One of his followers then sat on Gunga’s chest while another held his arms, and a third his legs, while a fourth cut off his nose, and one of his hands at the wrist, and the fingers of the other hand. He became senseless, and Maheput and his followers all left him in this state. In the evening a servant of Seochurn Chowdheree, of Bhowaneepoor, on his way to the jungle, saw him and reported his condition to his master, who sent people and had him taken to him on a litter. He had his wounds dressed by a village surgeon, and the next day sent him home to his wife and mother. The landlord of the village reported the case to Captain Orr, of the Frontier Police, at Fyzabad, who had Gunga taken off to the hospital at Lucknow, where he remained under the care of the Residency surgeon till he recovered. This poor man had to support his mother, wife, and daughter by his labour. His mother came in with him, and attended him in hospital, while his wife and child remained at their village.
While in hospital recovering, Maheput Sing was brought before him, by the Frontier Police, to be recognized. As soon as he saw him all the terrible scene of Ramdhun’s murder and his own torture came so vividly before him, that he trembled from head to foot, like a man in an ague fit, and was for some time unable to speak. At last, when he saw the fetters on Maheput’s legs, and the handcuffs on his wrists, and armed Government servants around him, he recovered his senses; and by degrees, recorded what he had witnessed and suffered at his hands.
On the 25th March 1850, Rajah Maun Sing, under orders from the Durbar, with all the force he could muster, invested the fort of Bhowaneegur, while the force under Captains Weston, Thomas, Bunbury, and Magness, attacked the three forts belonging to Rajah Prethee Put, of Paska. Maheput Sing left the fort on the 27th, with eleven followers, to collect reinforcements and harass the besiegers, and the garrison was commanded by his nephew.
On the 28th, Maun Sing had three men killed and several wounded, from the fire of the garrison, and wrote for reinforcements to Captain Weston, who was at Dureeabad, twelve miles distant. As soon as he got the letter, he mounted his horse, and leaving the force to follow, rode with his Assistant, Captain Orr, to the place, which is half a mile from Guneshpoor south, and two hundred yards from the left bank of the Goomtee river north. They were attended by a few sowars, under Seo Sing, and they reached the place before daybreak, on the 29th; and as soon as day appeared, proceeded with Captain Magness, who had galloped on in advance of his regiment to reconnoitre the fort, and were fired upon by the garrison wherever they were seen. Maun Sing’s people had retired after the loss of a few men, to the distance of a mile, and lay scattered over the jungle.
The Infantry came up before sunset, and the guns before it grew dark, and all were placed in position, and a fire opened upon the fort till it grew too dark to point the guns. The garrison soon after attempted to escape by the west side, and were fired upon by the parties posted on that quarter. Captain Weston, hearing the fire, collected all the men he could, and getting with difficulty into the fort, found it empty. In the attempt to cut their way through, the garrison had two men killed and fifteen wounded and taken, and five managed to escape, under cover of the night, into the thick jungle. Bikhai, one of the most atrocious of Maheput’s followers, was killed; but he killed two of the besiegers, and wounded two more before he fell. Akber Sing, the most atrocious of all the gang, had his arm taken off by a cannon-shot, and was seized. Maheput’s nephew, the commandant of the garrison, was taken, with one of Maheput’s secretaries and advisers.
Of Maun Sing’s party, four were killed and thirteen wounded, and Captain Magness had one havildar severely wounded. The fort was levelled, and the jungle around cut down. The force then proceeded and took possession of the forts of Futtehpoor, Oskamow, Sorrea, Dyeepoor, and Etonja, all belonging to Jugurnath Chuprassie, another leader of banditti of that district They were only a few miles distant from Bhowaneegur, and were deserted by his gangs on their seeing a British force and hearing the guns open upon Bhowaneegur. Two hundred head of stolen cattle were found in the forts of Jugurnath, and restored to their proper owners. Parties were sent in pursuit of Maheput Sing, and two of his followers were secured; but he himself escaped for the time. The forts were all destroyed. Captain Orr, the Assistant Superintendent, in charge of the Frontier Police at Fyzabad, had been long in pursuit of Maheput Sing, and his parties, knowing all his haunts and associates, gave him no rest. His subadar, Seetul Sing, became acquainted with Prethee Paul, tallookdar of Ramnuggur, who had been deprived of his estate for defalcation, and become associated with Maheput Sing. The subadar persuaded this landholder that it would be to his advantage to aid in the arrest of so atrocious a robber and murderer; and when Maheput next came to him to seek some repose from his pursuers, and consult about future plans, he sent intimation to Seetul Sing, whose detachment of sipahees was at no great distance. On receiving the intimation, the subadar marched forthwith, and reached the place at the dawn of day, on the morning of the 1st of July 1850. Maheput Sing had just left the house to perform his ablutions, but on seeing them, he suspected their designs and re-entered the house. The subadar’s party saw him, immediately surrounded the house, and demanded his surrender, Maheput Sing begged Prethee Paul to join him in defending the house or cutting their way through; but Prethee Paul told him that he had ruined himself by his atrocities, and must now submit to his fate, since he could not involve himself and all his family in ruin merely to assist him. Prethee Paul then took him by the arm, brought him out, and made him over to Seetul Sing, who had threatened to set fire to the house, forthwith unless he did so. He was then secured and taken off, well guarded, and in all possible haste, to Captain Orr, lest his gang might collect and attempt a rescue. Captain Orr sent him off, under a strong guard and well fettered, to Lucknow, to Captain Weston, the Superintendent of the Frontier Police.
Prethee Paul, the tallookdar, for the good service, got back his estate from the Oude sovereign, and an addition of five hundred rupees a-year to his nankar or personal allowance. Gunga Aheer is now a pensioner on the Residency fund, and his family has been provided for. Maheput Sing and his associate Gujraj were sentenced to transportation beyond seas, and sent off in October 1851.
It is remarked by the people, that few of these baronial robbers ever die natural deaths–that they either kill each other, or are killed sooner or later by the servants of Government. More atrocious crimes than those which they every month commit it is difficult to conceive. In the Bangor district, through which we passed last month, this class of landholders are certainly as strong and as much disposed to withhold the just dues of Government, and to resist its officers and troops, as they are here, but they do not plunder and burn down each other’s villages, and murder and rob each other’s tenants so often as they do here. The coalition has introduced among them a kind of balance of power, which makes them respect each other’s rights, and the rights of each other’s tenants, for the chiefs are dependent upon the attachment and fidelity of their respective tenants. The above list contains only a part of the leaders of gangs, by which the districts of Dureeabad, Rodowlee, Sidhore, Pertabgunge, Deva, and Jehangeerabad, are infested. We have seen no manufacture of any exportable commodity in Oude, nor have we seen traffic on any road in Oude, save that leading from Cawnpore to Lucknow.
In consequence of some bad seasons, a good deal of the grain required at the Capital, and in the districts to the north-cast, comes from Cawnpore over this road. Were the road from Fyzabad to Lucknow good and safe, a good deal of land produce would, in ordinary seasons, come over it from the Goruckpoor district, and those intervening between Lucknow and Fyzabad. It would, however, be useless to make the road till the gangs which infest it are put down. A good and secure road from Lucknow through Sultanpoor to Benares, would be of still greater advantage.
February 25, 1850.–Halted at Dureeabad. I here saw the draft- bullocks attached to the guns, with Captain Orr’s companies of Frontier Police. They are of the best kind, and in excellent condition. They have the same allowance of a seer and half of grain a-day, which is drawn for every bullock attached to his Majesty’s artillery. The difference is that they get all that is paid for in their name, while the others get one-third; and really got none when on detached duty till lately. On Fridays, Captain Orr’s bullocks get only half; and this is, I believe, the rule with all the others that get any at all. His bullocks are bred in the Nanpara, Nigasun, Dhorehra, and other districts in the Oude Tarae, and are of an excellent quality for work. They cost from 40 to 75 rupees a-pair. In these districts of the Tarae forest, the cows are allowed to go almost wild in large grass preserves, where they are defended from tigers; and the calves are taken from them, when a year old, to be taken care of at home, till sold for the dairy or for work. Captain Orr’s bullocks have no grazing-ground, nor are they sent out at all to graze–they get nothing but bhoosa (chaff) and corn. Of bhoosa they get as much as they can eat, when on detached duty, as they take it from the peasantry without payment; but when at Lucknow, they are limited to a very small quantity, as Government has to pay for it. On the 15th of May, 1833, the King prohibited any one from taking bhoosa without paying for it, either for private or public cattle; and directed that bhoosa, for all the Artillery bullocks, should be purchased at the harvests, and charged for in the public accounts; but the order was disregarded like that against the murder of female children.
February 26, 1850–Sidhore, sixteen miles, W.S.W. The country, a plain, covered as usual with spring crops and fine foliage; but intersected midway by the little river Kuleeanee, which causes undulations on each side. The soil chiefly doomut and light, but fertile. It abounds more in white ants than such light soil generally does. We passed through the estate of Soorujpoor Behreylee, in which so many of the baronial robbers above described reside, and through many villages beyond it, which they had lately robbed and burnt down, as far as such villages can be burnt. The mud-walls and coverings are as good as bomb-proofs against the fire, to which they are always exposed from these robbers. Only twenty days ago, Chundee Behraleea and his party attacked the village of Siswae, through which we passed a few miles from this–plundered it, and killed three persons, and six others perished in the flames. They served several others in the neighbourhood in the same manner; and have, within the same time, attacked and plundered the town of Sidhore itself several times.
The boundary which separates the Dureeabad from the Sidhore district we passed some four miles back; and the greater part of the villages lately attacked are situated in the latter, which is under a separate Amil, Aga Ahmud, who is, in consequence, unable to collect his revenue. The Amil of Dureeabad, Girdhara Sing,* on the contrary, acquiesces in all the atrocities committed by these robbers, and is, in consequence, able to collect his revenue, and secure the favour of the Court. Some of the villages of the estate, held by the widow of Singjoo, late Rajah of Soorujpoor, are under the jurisdiction of the Sidhore Amil; and, as she would pay no revenue, the Amil took a force a few days ago to her twelve villages of Sonowlee, within the Dureeabad district, and seized and carried off some three hundred of her tenants, men, women, and children, as hostages for the payment of the balance due, and confined them pell-mell, in a fort. The clamour of the rest of the population as I passed was terrible, all declaring that they had paid their rents to the Ranee, and that she alone ought to be held responsible. She, however, resided at Soorujpoor, within the jurisdiction, and under the protection of the Amil of Dureeabad.
[* Girdhara Sing’s patron is Chundee Sahaee, the minister’s deputy, whose influence is paramount at present.]
The Behraleea gangs have lately plundered the five villages of Sadutpoor, Luloopoor, Bilkhundee, and Subahpoor, belonging to Soorujbulee, the head Canoongo, or Chowdheree of Dureeabad, who had never offended them. Both the Amils were with me for the latter part of the road; and the dispute between them ran very high. It was clear, however, that Girdhara Sing was strong in his league with the robbers, and conscious of being able to maintain his ground at Court; and Aga Ahmud was weak in his efforts to put them down, and conscious of his being unable much longer to pay what was required, and keep his post. He has with him two Companies of Nujeebs and two of Telingas, and eight guns. The guns are useless and without ammunition, or stores of any kind; and the Nujeebs and Telingas cannot be depended upon. The best pay master has certainly the best chance. It is humiliating and distressing to see a whole people suffering such wrongs as are every day inflicted upon the village communities and town’s people of Dureeabad, Rodowlee, Sidhore, and Dewa, by these merciless freebooters; and impossible not to feel indignant at a Government that regards them with so much indifference.*
[* Poor Aga Ahmud was put into gaol, for defalcation, at the end of the season; but Girdhara Sing was received with great favour by the Court. The government of the district, for the next season, was confirmed, and the usual dress of honour was conferred upon him, but the Resident deemed it to be his duty to interpose and insist upon his not being sent out. The government of the district was, in consequence, taken from him, and made over to Rajah Maun Sing.]
A respectable young agricultural capitalist from Biswa, Seetaram, rode along by my side this morning, and I asked him, “over whom these suttee tombs, near Biswa, and other towns were for the most part raised.”–“Sir,” said he, “they are chiefly over the widows of Brahmins, bankers, merchants, Hindoo public officers, tradesmen, and shopkeepers.” “Are there many such tombs in Oude, over the widows of Rajpoot landholders?”–“I have not seen any, sir, and have rarely heard of the widow of a Rajpoot landholder burning herself.” “No, sir,” said Bukhtawar Sing, “how should such women be worthy to become suttees? They dare not become suttees, sir, with the murder of so many innocent children on their heads. Sir, we Brahmins and other respectable Hindoos feel honoured in having daughters; and never feel secure of a happy life hereafter till we see them respectably married. This, sir, is a duty the Deity demands from us, and the neglect of which we do not believe he can ever excuse. When the bridegroom comes sir, to fetch our daughter, the priest reads over the marriage-service, and the parents of the girl wash her feet and those of her bridegroom; and, as they sit together after the ceremonies, put into her arms a tray of gold and silver jewels, and rich clothes, such as their condition in life enables them to provide; and then invoke the blessing of God upon their union; and then, and not till then, do they feel that they have done their duty to their child. What can men and women, who murder their daughters as soon as they are born, ever hope for in this life or in a future state? What can widows, conscious of such crimes, expect from ascending the funeral pile, with the bodies of their deceased husbands who have caused them to commit such crimes?” “And you think that there really is merit in such sacrifices on the part of widows, who have done their duties in this life?”–“Assuredly I do, sir; if there were none, why should God render them go insensible to the pain of burning? I have seen many widows burn themselves in my time, and watched them from the time they first declared their intention to their death; and they all seemed to me to feel nothing whatever from the flames: nothing, sir, but support from above could sustain them through such trials. Depend upon it, sir, that no widow of a Rajpoot murderer of his own offspring would ever be so supported; they knew very well that they would not be so; and, therefore, very wisely never ventured to expose themselves to the trial: faithful wives and good mothers only could so venture. The Rajpoots, sir, and their wives were pleased at the prohibition, because others could no longer do what they dared not do!” “What do you think, Seetarum?”–“I think, sir, that this crime of infanticide had its origin solely in family pride, which will make people do almost anything. These proud Rajpoots did not like to put it into any man’s power to call them salahs or sussoors,* (brothers-in-law or fathers-in-law).
[* These are terms of abuse all over India. To call a man sussoor or salah, in abuse, is to say to him, I have dishonoured your daughter or your sister!]
“I remember an instance of a woman burning herself at Lasoora, six miles from Biswa, when I was fifteen years of age, and I am now twenty-five. She certainly seemed to suffer no pain. One forenoon she told her husband that in a former birth she had promised him that when he should be born a maha brahman at Biswa, she would unite herself in marriage to him, and live with him as his wife for twelve years; that these twelve years had now expired, and that she had that night received intimation from Heaven that her real husband, Rajah Kirpah Shunker, of Muthura, had died without having been married in this birth; that she was in reality his wife, and had already burnt herself five times with his body, and would now mix her ashes with his for the sixth time, and he must forthwith send her to the village of Lasoora, where she would become a suttee. The husband was astounded, for they had always lived together on the best possible terms, and out of the four children they had had two still survived. He and all their relations did all they could to dissuade her, but she disregarded them, and ran off to the Sewala (temple) in Biswa, which was built by my father. Thence she sent a Brahmin, by name Gokurn, to call me and my elder brother, Morlee Munohur, then seventeen years of age. We went, and she told us that she had been our mother in a former birth, and wished to see us once more before she died; she blessed us, and prayed that we might have each five sons, and then told us to arrange for her funeral pile at Lasoora, as all her former five suttees had been performed at that place.
“We thought she was delirious, and no one supposed that she would really burn herself. She, however, left the temple and proceeded towards Lasoora on foot, followed by a party of women and children, and by her husband, who continued to implore her to return home with him. He had a litter with him to take her, but she would not listen to him or to any one else. We reached Lasoora about an hour and a half before sunset, and she ordered the people to collect a large pile of wood for her, and told them that she would light it with a flame from her own mouth. They seemed to regard her as an inspired person, and did so. She mounted the pile, and it soon took fire, how I know not! Many people said they saw the flame come from her month, and all seemed to believe that it did so. The flames ascended, for it was in the month of March, and the wood was dry, and she seemed to be quite happy as she sat in the midst of them, and was burnt to death. Her husband told us, that she had lost one son some years before, and another only four days before she burnt herself, and that she had been much afflicted at his death. Whether there really had been such a person as Rajah Kirpah Shunker, no one ever thought it necessary to inquire. Her suttee tomb still stands at Lasoora among many others. Our mother was alive, though our father had been dead many years, and she used to say that the poor woman must have become deranged at the death of her child. The people all believed that she told the truth, and the husband was obliged to yield, though he seemed much afflicted. Her two sons still live, and reside at Biswa.” *
[* Moorlee Monowur, a very respectable agricultural capitalist, tells me, that all that his younger brother, Seetaram, told me, about the suttee, if strictly true, and can be proved by a reference to the poor woman’s husband and sons, who still survive, and to the people of Bilwa and Lasoora.]
I asked the Amil, “How he fed, clothed, and lodged his prisoners?” He said, “We always take them with us in our marches, secured in stocks or fetters. We cannot leave them behind, because we have no gaols or other places to keep them in, and require all our troops to move with us. As to food and clothing, they are obliged to provide themselves, or get their families or friends to provide them, for Government will not let us charge anything for their subsistence and clothing in the accounts.”
“I understand that you and all other public servants who have charge of prisoners not only make them provide themselves with food and clothing, but make them pay for lamp-oil, whether they have a lamp burning at night or not?”–“When they require a lamp they must of course pay for it, sir; prisoners are always a source of much anxiety to us, for if we send them to Lucknow, they are almost sure to be let out soon, on occasions of thanksgiving, or on payment of gratuities, and enabled to punish all who have assisted us in the arrest; and with hosts of robbers around us, we are always in danger of an attempt to rescue them, which may cost us many lives.” “If the gaol darogahs at Lucknow had not the power to sell his prisoners, sir,” said Bukhtawar Sing, “how should he be able to pay so much as he does for his place? He is obliged to pay five hundred rupees or more for his place, and is not sure of holding it a month after he has bought it, so many are the candidates for a place so profitable!” “But he gets a share of the subsistence money, paid for the prisoners from the Treasury, does he not?”–“Yes, sir; of the four pice a-day paid for them by the King, he takes two, and sends them to beg through the city for what more they require.” “If they get more than what he thinks they require from the public or their friends, he takes the surplus from them, I am told?”–“It is very true, sir, I believe. Fellows, sir, who have no substantial friends, and cannot and will not beg, soon sink under this scanty supply of food.”
February 27, 1850–Sutrick, sixteen miles west, over a plain of muteear soil, tolerably well cultivated, and very well studded with trees of the finest kinds, single, in clusters and in groves. The mango-trees are in blossom, and promise well. The trees are said to bear only one season out of three, but some bear in one season, and others in another, so that the market is always supplied, though in some seasons more abundantly than in others. A cloudy sky and easterly wind, while the trees are in blossom, are said to be very injurious. A large landholder told me that they never took a tax upon any of the trees, not even the mhowa-trees, but the owner could not, except upon particular occasions, dispose of one to be cut down, without the permission of the zumeendar upon whose lands it stood. He might cut down one without his permission for building or repairing his house, or for fuel, on any occasion of marriage in his family, but not otherwise. A good many fine trees were, he said, destroyed by the local officers of Government. Having no tents, they collected the roofs of houses from a neighbouring village in hot or bad weather, cut away the branches to make rafters, and left the trunks as pillars to support the roofs, and under this treatment they soon died. He told me that cow-dung was cheaper for fuel than wood in this district, and consequently more commonly used in cooking; but that they gathered cow-dung for fuel only during four months in the year, November, December, January, and February; all that fell during the other eight months was religiously left, or stored for manure. In the pits in which they stored it, they often threw some of the inferior green crops of autumn, such as kodo and kotkee; but the manure most esteemed among them was pigs’ dung–this, he said, was commonly stored and sold by those who kept pigs. The best muteear and doomut soils, which prevail in this district, are rented at two rupees a kutcha beegah, without reference to the crop which the cultivator might take from them; and they yielded, under good tillage, from ten to fifteen returns of the seed in wheat, barley, gram, &c. There are two and half or three kutcha beegahs in a pucka beegah; and a pucka beegah is from 2750 to 2760 square yards.
Sutrick is celebrated for the shrine of Shouk Salar, alias Borda Baba, the father of Syud Salar, whose shrine is at Bahraetch. This person, it is said, was the husband of the sister of Mahmood, of Ghuznee. He is supposed to have died a natural death at this place, while leading the armies of his sovereign against the Hindoos. His son had royal blood in his veins, and his shrine is held to be the most sacred of the two. A large fair is held here in March, on the same days that this fair takes place at Bahraetch. All our Hindoo camp followers paid as much reverence to the shrine as they passed as the Mahommedans. It is a place without trade or manufactures; but a good many respectable Mahommedan families reside in it, and have built several small but neat mosques of burnt bricks. There is little thoroughfare in the wretched road that passes through it.
The Hindoos worship any sign of manifested might or power, though exerted against themselves, as they consider all might and power to be conferred by the Deity for some useful purpose, however much that purpose may be concealed from us. “These invaders, however merciless and destructive to the Hindoo race, say they must have been sent on their mission by God for some great and useful purpose, or they could not possibly have succeeded as they did: had their proceedings not been sanctioned by Him, he could at any moment have destroyed them all, or have interposed to arrest their progress.” These, however, are the speculations of only the thinking portion. At the bottom of the respect shown to such Mahommedan shrines, by the mass of Hindoos, there is always a strong ground-work of hope or fear: the soul or spirit of the savage old man, who had been so well supported on earth, must still, they think, have some influence at the Court of Heaven to secure them good or work them evil, and they invoke or propitiate him accordingly. They would do the same to the tomb of Alexander, Jungez Khan, Tymour, or Nadir Shah, without any perplexing inquiries as to their creed or liturgy.
February 28, 1850.–Chinahut, eleven miles west, over a plain intersected by several small streams, the largest of which is the Rete, near Sutrick. There is a good deal of kunkur-lime in the ground over which we have passed today; but the tillage is good where the land is at all level, and the crops are fine. The plain is cut up here and there by some ravines, but they are small and shallow, and render but a small portion of the surface unfit for tillage. The banks of the small streams are, for the most part, cultivated up to the water’s edge.
We passed the Rete over a nice bridge, built by Rajah Bukhtawar Sing twenty-five years ago, at a cost of twenty-five thousand rupees, out of his own purse. He told me that one morning, in the rains, he came to the bank of this river, on his way to Lucknow from Jeytpoor, a town which we passed yesterday, and found it so swollen that he was obliged to purchase some large earthen jars, and form a raft upon them to take over himself and followers. While preparing his raft, which took a whole day, he heard that from five to ten persons were drowned, in attempting to cross this little river, every year, and that people were often detained upon the bank for four or five days together. He resolved to save people from all this evil; and as soon as he got home set about building this bridge, and got it ready before the next rains. It is a substantial work, with three good arches. About two miles on this side of the bridge he pointed out to me the single tree, near a mango-grove, where some eighteen or twenty years ago he overtook a large balloon, which the King, Nuseer-od Deen Hyder, had got made in the Dilkosha Park at Lucknow. It was made, he tells me, by a tall and slender young English gentleman, who visited Lucknow, with his uncle, for the special purpose of constructing and ascending in this machine. “When it was all ready, sir, the young man got into a small boat that was suspended under it, taking with him a gun and some artificial fish. We asked him what he intended to do with a gun in the clouds; and he told us, that in the sky he was in danger of meeting large birds that might hurt the balloon, and the gun was necessary to frighten them off. As the balloon began to ascend the old gentleman’s eyes filled with tears, and I asked him why. He told me, that this young man’s father had fallen into the sea, and been drowned; and he was always afraid, when the son went up, that he might never see him alive again.
“The King was sitting at the window in the upper story of the Dilkosha house, with some English gentlemen, when the balloon passed up close by, and the gentleman took off his hat and bowed gracefully as he passed, at which the King seemed much pleased. I commanded a regiment of Dragoons, and the King told me to take a party of my boldest and best-mounted men and follow the balloon. I selected seventeen, and we were all ready in our saddles. The balloon went straight up, and we lost sight of the man and the boat in which he sat. The machine, though it was sixty feet long, including boat and all, and twelve feet wide, seemed at last to be no larger than a small water-jug. Below we had no wind, but we soon saw the balloon driven by an upper current to the eastward, along the Fyzabad road. We followed as fast as the horses could carry us, crossed the Goomtee river over the old stone bridge, and passed many travellers on the road staring at the extraordinary machine, for they had heard nothing about it, and we had no time to tell them. When we had gone about seventeen miles, the balloon began to descend. It was in the month of March, and the weather was hot, and I had lost three horses before it came to the ground. The young man then began to let go his fish, and they came fluttering down, while the oil-cloths about the balloon made a noise like the growling of a wild beast. Seeing the enormous machine going at this rate, followed by us at full speed, the people along the road, who are always numerous in the morning, became so panic-struck that a great many fell down senseless upon their faces, and some of them could not be got to rise for some hours afterwards.
“We were not far from it when it approached the ground, and swept along on the border of this grove, on our left. Fortunately for the young man, it did not strike any trees. He was dressed all in black, and a very tall, handsome young man he was. As soon as he found himself near enough to the ground, he jumped out, holding one rope in his hand, and tried to stop the balloon, calling out to the people on the road, as loud as he could, puckaro, puckaro!–seize, seize! We were then within two hundred yards of it, and at full speed; and, instead of helping the young man, the people on the road, thinking the order was to seize them, fell down flat on their faces, unable to look upon the balloon, or utter a word. They all thought that it was some terrible demon from above come to seize and devour them. When we had headed it a little, we all sprang from our saddles, joined the young man at the ropes, and lashed them round anything we could find, as we were being dragged along. The young man took out his penknife, and gave the balloon a gash in the side, to let out the smoke that inflated it, and it collapsed and stopped. The first thing, sir, that the young man did was to call for fire, take a cigar from his waistcoat pocket, and begin to smoke, while we went to the assistance of the panic-struck travellers, many of whom were still lying senseless on the ground. We got water, and threw it in their faces; and when they were able to sit up, we mounted the young man upon one of our horses, and took him back slowly to Lucknow. He told me that it was so very cold above, that it gave him a severe headache, and that he found a cigar a good thing to remove it. The King was very glad when we brought him back, and he gave him several thousand rupees over and above the cost of making the balloon, and providing him and his uncle during their stay. They soon after left Lucknow for Lahore, and what became of them I know not.”
Passing a Mahommedan village, I asked some of the landholders, who walked along by the side of my elephant, to talk of their grievances, whether they ever used pigs’ dung for manure. They seemed very much surprised and shocked, and asked how I could suppose that Mahommedans could use such a thing. “Come,” said Bukhtawar Sing, “do not attempt to deceive the Resident. He has been all over India, and knows very well that Mahommedans do not keep or eat pigs; but he knows, also, that there is no good cultivator in Oude who does not use the dung of pigs for manure; and you know that there is no other manure, save' pigeons’ dung, that is so good.” “We often purchase manure from those who prepare it,” said the landholders, “and do not ask questions about what it may be composed of; but the greater part of the manure we use is the cow-dung which falls in the season of the rains, and is stored exclusively for that purpose. In the dry months, sir, the dung of cows, bullocks, buffaloes, &c., is gathered, formed into cakes, and stacked for fuel; but in the rains it is all thrown into pits and stored for manure.”
Chinahut is the point from which we set out on the 2nd of December, and here I was met by the prime minister, Nawab Allee Nakee Khan, and the chancellor of the exchequer, Maharajah Balkrishun, to whom I explained my views as to the measures which ought to be adopted to save the peaceful and industrious portion of his Majesty’s subjects from the evils which now so grievously oppress them.
Here closes my pilgrimage of three months in Oude; and I can safely say that I have learnt more of the state of the country, and the condition and requirements of the people, than I could possibly have learnt in a long life passed exclusively at the capital of Lucknow. Any general remarks that I may have to make on what I have seen and heard during the pilgrimage I must defer to a future period.
At four in the afternoon, I left Chinahut, and returned to Lucknow. At the old race-stand, about three miles from the Residency, I was met by the heir-apparent, and drove with him, in his carriage, to the Furra Buksh Palace, where we alighted for a few minutes, to go through the usual tedious ceremonies of an Oriental Court. On the way we were met by Mr. Hamilton, the chaplain, and his lady. Dr. and Mrs. Bell, and Captain Bird, the First Assistant, and his brother and guest. After the ceremony, I took leave of the Prince, and reached the Resident at six o’clock. My wife and children had left me at Peernuggur, to return, for medical advice, to the Residency, where I had the happiness to find them well, and glad to see me. Having broken my left thigh hone, near the hip joint, in a fall from my horse, in April, 1849, I was unable to mount a horse during the tour, and went in a tonjohn the first half of the stage, and on an elephant the last half, that I might see as much as possible of the country over which we were passing. The pace of a good elephant is about that of a good walker, and I had generally some of the landholders and cultivators riding or walking by my side to talk with.
END OF THE TOUR.
PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE
RELATING TO THE ANNEXATION OF THE KINGDOM OF OUDE TO BRITISH INDIA.
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Camp, Nawabgunge, 5th December, 1849.
My Dear Bird,
I had heard from Mahomed Khan what you mention regarding the imposition practised on the King by the singers; but from his having conferred a khilaut on the knaves, they supposed that he had, as usual, pardoned all. If you have grounds to believe that the King is prepared to punish them, or to acquiesce in their punishment, pray ask an audience and ascertain his Majesty’s wishes. When we last went, I was in hopes that he would tell me that he wished to be relieved of their presence, and did all I could to encourage him to do so. If the King wishes to have them removed, encourage him to give immediate orders to the minister to confine them; and offer any assistance that may be required to take them across the Ganges, or put them into safe custody. When it is done, it must be done promptly.
As to the Taj Mahal, I went on an order by Richmond, “that the King should put a Mahaldarnee upon her if he wished.” I was told that such was Richmond’s order, and I give mine in consequence. I will refer to the Dufter for his order. But you must at once insist upon all sipahees being withdrawn from her house. This order was given by me and should be enforced by you. I said that the Mahaldarnee might remain, but it must be alone, without sipahees, &c.
On emergency, act of course on your own discretion I only wish that the King may be induced to consent to the removal of all the singers, and meddling eunuchs also.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Bird, First Assistant.
Sadik Allee should be secured, and punished with the rest.
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
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Camp, Bahraetch, 10th December, 1849.
My Dear Bird,
The conduct of the singers which exasperated the King had no reference to public matters with which he was pledged not to permit them to interfere; and my only request was, that you should offer your aid in removing them should his Majesty indicate any wish for it. The King said he would himself punish them for their conduct by banishment across the Ganges, and he must be left to do so: it was not from any demand made by us, but from resentment for a personal affront, or an affront to his understanding. We cannot call upon the King to do what he said he would do under such circumstances, but must leave it to himself. The removal of two out of a dozen fellows of this description will be of no use–their places will soon be filled by others. Any attempt on your part to supply their places by better men will only tend to indispose the King towards them; and it is no part of our duty to dictate to his Majesty with whom he shall associate in his private hours.
I have had abundant proof that, to reduce the influence of the present favourites, has no tendency to throw the power into better hands–no authority of any kind taken from them has, by the minister, been confided to better men; the creatures of one are not a whit better than the creatures of the other. If his Majesty were to rouse himself, and apply his own mind to business, we might hope for some good, and I see little chance of this.
You are not to order that the King fulfil his promise, because, as I have said, it was no pledge made on the requisition of our Government on the Resident. If he does not fulfil it, it is only one proof more added to a hundred of his exceeding weakness. There are at least a dozen worse men now influencing all that the King and minister do than Kotab Alee and Gholam Ruza. The last order given regarding Taj Mahal by me was, that she should admit a Mahaldarnee from the King, but that no sipahees should be forced upon her. I wrote to the King to this effect, and my order must be enforced. I am told by the moonshee, that when the King expressed a wish to have such guardians upon many, Richmond replied that he might have one upon Taj Mahal, who had given such proof of profligacy. It was not a judicial decision, to be referred to as a guide under all circumstances, but a mere arrangement which might any day require to be altered. Taj Mahal is so profligate and insolent a woman, that if she refuses to obey my order, and receive the King’s Mahaldarnee, I shall withdraw the Residents.
After what the Governor-General had told the King in November, 1847, regarding what our Government would feel itself bound to do, unless his Majesty conducted the duties of a sovereign better than he had hitherto done; and after the experience we have since had of his entire neglect of those duties, you should not, I think, have said what you mention having said to him, that our Government had no wish to deprive him of one iota of the power he had. It was a declaration not called for by the circumstances, or necessary on the occasion, and should have been avoided, as it is calculated to impair the impression of his responsibility for the exercise of his power. No sovereign ever showed a greater disregard for the duties and responsibilities of his high office than he has done hitherto, and as our Government holds itself answerable to the people of Oude for a better administration, he should not be encouraged in the notion that he may always show the same disregard with impunity–that is, continue to retain every iota of his power whether he exercised it properly or not. No man, I believe, ever felt more anxious for the welfare of the King, his family, and country, than I do; but unless he exercises his fearful power better, I should be glad, for the sake of all, to see the whole, or part of it, in better hands.
The minister has his Motroussil with me, and I have daily communications of what is done or proposed to be done, and you may be sure that I lose no occasion of admonition. I did not mention anything you said regarding your interview with the King in your letter to Mahomed Khan; but in a few hours after your letter came he got the whole from the minister, and reported it to me. He wants us to undertake the work of turning out the King’s favourites, that he may get all the power they lose, without offending his master by any appearance of moving in the matter.
We go hence to-morrow; hope to be at Gonda on the 14th, and Fyzabad on the 18th. I have requested the post-master to send all our letters to Fyzabad by the regular dawk from Thursday next, the 13th. From Fyzabad I will arrange for their coming to my camp.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Bird, &c. &c.
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Camp, Ghunghole, 12th December, 1849.
My Dear Bird,
I got your letter of the 9th instant last night, at our last ground. In what you have done, you have not, I think, acted discreetly. You asked me whether, in any case of emergency, you should act on your discretion, and I told you in reply that you might do so; but surely, whether the King should have a dozen singers or only ten could not be considered one of such pressing emergency as not to admit of your waiting for instructions from me, or, at least, for a reply to your letter. The King has told you truly, that the matter in which the offenders had transgressed had reference to his house, and not to his Government or ours. This is a distinction which you appear to have lost sight of from the first. If I demand reparation from another for wrong or insults suffered from his servants, and he promises to punish them by dismissal from his service but afterwards relents and detains them, I consider it due to myself and my character to insist upon the fulfilment of his promise; but if I voluntarily visit any friend who has at last become sensible of the impositions of his servants which had long been manifest to all his neighbours, with a view to encourage him in his laudable resolution to dismiss them from his service, and to offer my aid in effecting the object should he require it, and he promises me not to swerve from it, but afterwards relents and retains the impostors, I pity his weakness, but I do not consider it due to myself, or to my character, to insist upon his fulfilling his promise. By considering two cases so very distinct, the same, you have placed yourself in a disagreeable situation, for I cannot support you; that is, I can neither demand that the requisitions made by you be complied with, nor can I tell the King that I approve of them. Had you waited for my reply, which was sent off from Bahraetch on the 10th, you would have saved yourself all this annoyance and mortification. It has arisen from an overweening confidence in your personal influence over his Majesty; the fact is, I believe that no European gentleman ever has had or ever will have any personal influence over him, and I very much doubt whether any real native gentleman will ever have any. He never has felt any pleasure in their society, and I fear never will. He has hitherto felt easy only in the society of such persons as those with whom he now exclusively associates, and to hope that he will ever feel easy with persons of a better class is vain. I am perfectly satisfied, in spite of the oath he has taken in the name of his God, and on the head of his minister, that he made to you the promise you mention; and I am no less satisfied that the minister wished for the removal of the singers, provided it should be effected through us without his appearing to his master to move in the matter, and that he wished their removal solely with a view to acquire for himself the authority they had possessed. You should not have any more audiences with the King without previous reference to me; nothing is likely to occur to require it.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Bird, &c. &c.
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Camp, Fyzabad, 18th December, 1819.
My Dear Bird,
I send you the letter which you wish to refer to. As you quote my first letter, pray let me see it. I kept no copy, but have a distinct recollection of what I intended to say in it regarding this affair of the singers. It shall be sent back to you. The term “indiscreet” had reference only to your second visit, and demand from the King of the fulfilment of his promise. I had no fault whatever to find with your first visit. The term “private” must have had reference, not to the promise or to the person to whom it was made, but to the offence with which the singers stood charged. It was an affront offered to the King’s understanding that he took affront at, and whether he had made a promise to resent it as such to me, or to you could make no difference. If he did not fulfil it, we should pity this further instance of his weakness, but could have no right to insist upon his doing so. Even had the offence been an interference in public affairs, and breach of the King’s engagements, I should not have demanded their banishment without a reference to the Governor- General, because the delay of waiting for instructions involved no danger or serious inconvenience; that is, I should not have demanded it when the King was so strongly opposed to it. I must distinctly deny that you demanded the King’s fulfilment of his promise in conformity to any instructions received from me, or in accordance with my views of what was right or expedient in this matter. Your second visit and demand were neither in conformity to the one nor in accordance with the other. You must have put a construction upon what I wrote which it cannot fairly bear. By “requisitions” I mean your requirements that the two men should be banished by the King, according to his promise. No notice has been made to me of your visit by the Court, and I have therefore had no occasion to say anything whatever about it in my communications to the Court, nor shall I have any I suppose. In your letter of the 4th instant, you say, with regard to the Taj Mahal’s case, “Not knowing whether you do or do not wish me to act in any sudden emergency during your absence, I suppose, therefore, that had you had any such wish you would have instructed me on the subject.” In reply, I requested that you would so act on your own discretion in any such sudden case of emergency.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Bird, &c. &c. __________________________
Camp, Mahomdee, 2nd February, 1850.
My Dear Sir Erskine,
Had it not been too late for you to join my camp conveniently, I should have asked you to run out and see a little of the country and people of Oude, after you had seen so much of those of the Honourable Company’s dominions. A few years of tolerable government would make it the finest country in India, for there is no part of India with so many advantages from nature. I have seen no soil finer; the whole plain of which it is composed is capable of tillage; it is everywhere intersected by rivers, flowing from the snowy chain of the Himmalaya, which keep the moisture near the surface at all times, without cutting up any of the land on their borders into deep ravines; it is studded with the finest groves and single trees, as much as the lover of the picturesque could wish; it has the boldest and most industrious peasantry in India, and a landed aristocracy too strong for the weak and wretched Government; it is, for the most part, well cultivated; yet with all this, one feels, in travelling over it, as if he was moving among a people suffering under incurable physical diseases, from the atrocious crimes every day perpetrated with impunity, and the numbers of suffering and innocent people who approach him, in the hope of redress, and are sent away in despair.
I think your conclusion regarding the source of the signs you saw of beneficial interference in the north-west provinces a fair one. A Lieutenant-Governor is able to see all parts of the country under his charge every year, or nearly all; and while he is sufficiently “monarch of all he surveys” to feel an interest in, and to provide for the general good, he has a sufficient knowledge of the internal management of particular districts to control the proceedings of the local officers. He is also well seconded in a very efficient Board of Revenue. But I must not indulge in these matters any further, till I have the pleasure of meeting you where we can talk freely about them.
I trust that all at Lucknow will be conducted to your satisfaction and that of Mrs. Erskine. I have this morning received a note from Mr. Erskine, who left you, it appears, before the little heir- apparent returned your visit. I expect to complete my tour and return to Lucknow on the 20th, when I shall have seen all that I required to see, to understand the working of the existing system, and the probable effects of any suggested changes.
With kind regards to Mrs. Erskine,
Believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir Erskine Perry.
P.S.–I must not omit to thank you for the expression of your favourable opinion of the “Rambles.” There is one thing of which I can assure you, that the conversations mentioned in it are genuine, and give the real thoughts and opinions of the people on the subjects they embrace. W. H. S.
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Lucknow, 26th April, 1850.
My Dear Elliot,
I did not send Weston’s letters with the other papers, because they were not written in an official form. He was the senior officer with the force, and had authority from the Durbar to call upon all local, civil, and military authorities to co-operate in the work; but he did not take upon himself the command, or write in official form. He inspired all with harmony and energy, and brought the whole strength of the little force to bear upon the right points at the right time.
The head of Prethee Put of Paska was cut off by Captain Magness’s sipahees after his death, to be sent to the King as a trophy, but Captain Weston would not let it come in. The body was offered to his family and friends for interment, but none of the family or tribe (Kolhun’s Rajpoots) would have anything to do with the funeral ceremonies of a man who had murdered his eldest brother and the head of his tribe. The body was, with the head, put into a sheet, taken to the river Ghagra, and committed to the stream, to flow to the Ganges, as the best interment for a Hindoo. These sipahees knew nothing of the man’s history; but the people who saw the affair from the Dhundee Fort mentioned that the body was thrown into the river at the precise place where he had thrown in that of his eldest brother, after murdering him in the boat with his own hands, as stated in the extract from my Diary; and all believe that this retribution arises from an interposition from above. The eldest son of the murdered brother will, I hope, be put into possession of the estate.
The Governor-General may like to peruse these letters, and I send them. They give, perhaps, a fuller and better account of what was done, and the manner in which it was done, than more studied compositions, in an official form, would have given.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir H. M. Elliot, K.C.B.
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Lucknow, 8th July, 1850.
My Dear Sir James,
I feel that my Indian career, which has now lasted forty years, must be drawing to a close, and I am anxious for the settlement in life of my only son, now between seventeen and eighteen years of age. Having no personal claims upon any member of the Home Government of India, I solicit the insertion of his name on his Grace the Duke of Wellington’s list of candidates for a commission in the Dragoons; and he is now preparing for his examination under the care of Mr. Yeatman, at Westow Hill, Norwood, Surrey, near London. But he is ambitious to obtain an appointment to Bengal, where his father has served so long, and may, possibly, have friends and recollections that might be useful to him in the early part of his career. It falls to the lot of few to have the opportunities that I have had to carry out the benevolent views of Government in measures of great and general benefit to the people, and to secure their gratitude and affection to their rulers. All the measures which I have been employed to carry out have tended to display the benevolent solicitude of the Government of India for the welfare of the people committed to its charge; the object of all has been the greater security of life and property throughout the country, the greater confidence of the people in the wisdom and efficiency of our rule, and their greater feeling of interest in this stability. These measures, as far as they have been confided to my care, have all succeeded; but, as I have stated (p. 79) in a printed report, a copy of which will be sent to you, they have neither flattered the vainglory of any particular nation, nor enlisted on their side the self-love of any influential class or powerful individual, and they have, in consequence, been attended with little éclat. They have, however, tended to secure to the Government the gratitude and affection of the people of India, and are measures of which that Government may justly feel proud. The stability of our Government in India must depend less upon our military victories than upon the confidence and affection with which our civil and political administration may inspire the great mass of the people. The general belief is, that our object is their substantial good, and that we are instruments in the hands of Divine Providence to effect that object. In our military glory they can feel no sympathy, and in our territorial acquisitions little interest; but they can and do appreciate every measure which tends to improve the security of life, property, and industry through the land–to restore the bond of good feeling between the Government and governed, where it has for a time been severed or impaired by accident–to provide the people with works tending to improve their comfort and convenience–to mitigate sufferings from calamities of season, and to encourage all to exert themselves honestly in their proper sphere. In carrying out the views of Government in such measures, and such only, has my life in India been spent; and for doing so to the best of my humble ability I have, I believe, done much to make its rule revered throughout India. It is by such measures that the respect and confidence of the great mass of the people have been secured, so as to enable Europeans, male and female, to pass from one end of the country to the other with the assurance, not only that they will suffer no personal injury, but no mark of disrespect. Should anything occur to deprive us of this confidence and respect among the great mass of the people, the recollection of our victories, and assurance of our superior military organization will avail us but little; and it is as one who has zealously and successfully aided Government in securing them, that I now venture to address you, in the hope that you will–if you can do so consistently with your public duties and pledges to others–open to my son the same career of usefulness by conferring upon him a nomination to the civil service of India. He is now five months above seventeen years of age; and by the time he is eighteen, he will, I hope, under Mr. Yeatman’s judicious care, be able to pass his examination for Haileybury, should he, through your means, obtain this the utmost object of his ambition. Over and above the desire to follow his father’s footsteps in India, he is anxious to avoid the necessity of encroaching so much upon the small means I have to provide for his four sisters, by entering so expensive a branch of the public service as the Dragoons. I know the great nature of the favour I ask from you. It is the first favour that I have ever asked from any member of the Home Government of India; and I solicit it from you solely on the ground of service rendered to the Government and people of India. I am told that I must address my application to an individual; and I address it to you, under the impression that you are the member with whom such ground is likely to meet with most consideration;–not that I think any member of the Honourable Court would disregard it; for I believe, after long and varied experience in public affairs, and much thought and reading, that no body intrusted with the Government of a distant possession ever performed their duties with more earnest solicitude for its welfare than the Court of Directors of the Honourable East India Company; but because your public career has inspired me with more confidence than that of any other member of the Court as now constituted. If you cannot grant me the favour I ask, you will, I know, pardon the liberty I have taken in asking it.
And believe me, with great respect,
Yours faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James Weir Hogg, Bart.
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Lucknow, 20th September, 1850.
My Dear Sir Charles,
The papers give us reason to hope that it is your intention to visit Lucknow on your way down from the hills, and if you can make it convenient to come, I shall be rejoiced to have the opportunity of showing you all that is worth seeing, and be able to afford all who come with you, ladies and gentlemen, accommodation.
The only road to Lucknow for carriages is from Cawnpore, and if you come that way, I will have carriages sent for you. If you come by any other road, I will have elephants sent to whatever place you may mention, and tents if required. It has been usual, when the Commander-in-chief visits Lucknow, for Government to intimate the intention to the King through the Resident in Oude, that preparation may be made for his reception in due form.
I mention this that you may make known your wish or intention to the Governor-General, in time for me to prepare the King and his Court.
From Cawnpore to this is only a drive of six hours, the distance being fifty miles, and the road good. All officers, &c., will be glad to have an opportunity of paying their respects to their distinguished Chief.
Believe me,
Yours very faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To his Excellency Sir Charles Napier, G.C.B., &c. &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 7th November, 1850.
My Dear Allan,
In the “Englishman” of the 28th, and the “Hurkara” of the 29th, there are some strictures on Oude affairs. The editors of both papers are, I believe, sturdy, honest men; but their correspondents are not acquainted with the merits of the particular case referred to, or with Oude affairs generally. I vouch for the truth of everything stated in the enclosed paper, and shall feel obliged if you will give it to the one most likely, in your opinion, to make a fair use of it. There can be no harm in putting an editor in possession of the real truth in a question involving not only individual but national honour; for he must be anxious to make his paper the vehicle of truth on all such questions.
I do not like to address either of the editors, because Government expect all their servants will abstain from doing so in their own vindication, and will leave their honour in their keeping. I have done so since 1843, and should now do so were I alone concerned in this affair. You may mention my name as authority for what is stated, but pray let it be mentioned confidentially. Government has been informed of the truth, and it is well that the public should be so.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN
To J. Allan, Esq.
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Lucknow, 17th November, 1850.
My Dear Sir James,
I thank you for your very kind letter of the 7th ultimo: my son is preparing for his examination, and expects his commission in some regiment of cavalry very soon. He has not only become reconciled to it, but would, I believe, now prefer remaining at home as a cavalry officer to coming to India in any capacity. As I have only one son, and he has four sisters to look after, I should be unwilling to have him sent out to India as a cadet, were he anxious to be so. A good regiment is an excellent school for a young man, but no school could be worse than a bad regiment; and among so many, there must always be some bad. I have seen some of the sons of my old friends utterly ruined in character and constitution by being posted to such regiments when too young to think for themselves. I feel, however, as grateful to you for your very kind offer as I should be, were I to avail myself of it.
If I return to England, I shall take advantage of the earliest opportunity to pay my respects and become personally acquainted with you; but I have no intention to leave India as long as I feel that I can perform efficiently the duties intrusted to me.
I had a few days ago, in referring to Government an important question that must some day come before you, occasion to mention an important and interesting fact. During the last collision with the Seiks, I found that the Government securities kept up their value here, while in Calcutta they fell a good deal; and the merchants here employed agents in Calcutta to purchase largely for sale here. Paper to the value of more than three millions sterling, or three crores of rupees, is held by people residing in the city of Lucknow, and the people had never the slightest doubt that we should be ultimately triumphant. The question was whether heirs and executors of persons domiciled here and leaving property in Government securities, should apply to Her Majesty’s Supreme Court in Calcutta, for probates to wills and letters of administration, or whether an act should be passed to render the decision of the highest Court at Lucknow, countersigned, by the Resident, as valid as the certificate of a judge in our own provinces, as far as such property in Government securities might be concerned. A provision of this sort had been omitted in Act 20 of 1841, which was considered applicable to all British India, of which the kingdom of Oude was held to form a part.
We have now a fair prospect of long peace, during which I hope our finances will improve. The lavish life-pensions granted after wars in Central and Southern India will be lapsing with the death of the present incumbents, many of whom are becoming old and infirm, and our means of transit and irrigation will increase with the new works which are being formed, and we shall always have it in our power to augment our revenue from indirect taxation, as wealth and industry increase.
Believe me, My Dear Sir James,
Very faithfully and obligedly yours,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James Weir Hogg, Bart.
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Lucknow, 2nd March, 1851.
My Lord,
The mail of the 24th January has just come in, and I find my only son Henry Arthur gazetted for the 16th Dragoons. He told me by the last mail that he was to be so if he passed his examination on the 10th of that month, which he hoped to do; but I deferred writing to thank you for your kind exertions in his behalf till his name should appear in the “Gazette.” I pray your Lordship to accept my most grateful acknowledgments for this act of kindness, added as it has been to the many others which I have received at your hands. It is not the less valuable that it is the only favour I have received from England since I left it more than forty years ago, though, I believe, few have done more to benefit the people of its eastern dominions, and to secure for it their esteem and affection.
I trust that my son will never do anything to make your Lordship regret the favour conferred upon me and him on this occasion. He is, I believe, in disposition, manners, and education a little gentleman; and in time he will, I hope, become a good officer.
If I might take the liberty, I would pray your Lordship to offer, in such terms as may appear to you suitable, my grateful acknowledgments for the consideration I have received, to his Grace the Duke of Wellington, and to Lord Fitzroy Somerset. My London Agents, Messrs. Denay, Clark, and Co., of Austin Friars, have been instructed to pay for my son’s commission and outfit, and to provide him with the funds indispensably necessary in addition to his pay.
We shall now look with much interest to the Parliamentary discussions on Indian affairs, for we must expect some important changes on the renewal of the Charter. Whatever these changes may be for the home or local Government, I trust the benefit of the people of India will be considered the main point, and not the triumph of a party. The statesman who shall link India more closely with New Zealand will be a benefactor to both England and India, and that colony also. It might, with advantage to itself, take those children of Indian officers who cannot find employment of any kind in India, and ought not to be thrown back upon the mother-country. With this view, it might be useful to transfer our orphan institutions to that island, to direct that way our invalid and pensioned officers, who, while subsisting upon their pensions or stipends, would be able to establish their children in a climate suitable to the preservation of their race, which that of India certainly is not.
India is at present tranquil, and likely to remain so. We have no native chiefs, or combination of native chiefs, to create uneasiness; and if we continue to satisfy the great body of the people that we are anxious, to the best of our ability, to promote their happiness and welfare, and are the most impartial arbitrators that they could have, we shall have nothing to fear. The moment that this mass is impressed with the belief that we wish to govern India only for ourselves, or as the French govern Algiers, from that moment we must lose our vantage ground and decline. We may war against the native chiefs of India, but we cannot war against the people–we need not fear what may be called political dangers, but we must guard carefully against those of a social character which would unite against us the members of all classes and all creeds.
But I must no longer indulge in speculations of this sort, in which you can now feel little interest amidst the important changes which are now taking place in the institutions and relations of European nations. With grateful recollections of kindness received, and great respect, I remain, Your Lordship’s obedient servant, (Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Right Hon. the Earl of Ellenborough.
P.S.–Since writing the above, I have received your Lordship’s letter of the 18th of January, and have been much gratified with the favourable opinion you entertain of the commandant and officers. It is the best assurance I could have of my boy being safe. Nothing could be more auspicious than the opening of the lad’s career, and I trust he will profit by the advantage.
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Lucknow, 18th March, 1851.
My Dear Sir Erskine,
I have read over with much interest the two small works you have done me the favour to send me, the one on Buddhism, and the other on Law Reform; but I have not ventured upon the Seventh Report of the Board of Education yet, because I have had a good deal to do and think about; and a good deal of it is in small print, very trying for my eyes, which are none of the strongest. I shall, however, soon read it.
I concur in all your views about the necessity of throwing overboard the whole system of special pleading, and have been amused with Sir J. P. Grant’s horror of your proposed innovations. It is not less than that which he expressed at the little Macaulay Code, intended to blow up the whole pyramid raised by “the wisdom of our ancestors,” in which so many illustrious characters he entombed. He was, indeed, as you say, “a great laudator temporis acti;” but the number of those like him at all times in England and its distant possessions is fearful. One likes to look to America in this as in all things tending to advancement; but there the “damned spot” stares us in the face, blights our hopes, and crushes our sympathies–hideous slavery –hideous alike in the recollection of the past, the contemplation of the present, and the anticipation of the future. I wish two things–
- That you would write a work on the subject less “sketchy and perfunctory,” as you call it, so that any one not versed in English law and procedure might be able to understand it and appreciate it thoroughly. 2nd. That you would, when relieved from your present office, come out as our law member of council, to press your views on our Government with effect. With these law reforms, as with railroads, there were less impediments in India than in England; but there is one thing that I would observe. In our own Indian Courts our judges would–for a time at least–want the aid of honest masters to condense and report upon cases under trial. Such men would be made in time; and in considering such things, we must recollect that almost the only persons in India who can send agents into all parts of it, with a perfect assurance of honest dealing, are the native merchants and bankers. But I won’t dwell on this subject. I can’t find amongst the numerous Buddhists here, one who knows anything about “Kapila vasta,” which you place near to Lucknow. I should like to visit the birth-place of a man who did so much for mankind as Sakeen Gantama.
He would hardly have done as I have, placed my only son in the 16th Lancers. However, I may console myself, for he may be in it a long time without doing much mischief, for I do hope that the people of the nations of modern Europe are too strong and too wise to let their sovereigns and ministers play such fantastic tricks as they were “wont to play,” when George the 3rd, and Edward the 3rd, and Henry the 5th were kings. Property, good sense, and good business have greatly increased and spread, and are every day producing good fruits.
Believe me,
Yours very trusting,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir Erskine Perry, &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 31st March, 1851.
My Dear Sir,
I grieve to say that I can do nothing whatever for the son of my late friend Colonel Ouseley, and have been obliged to write to him to that effect, as to many other sons of old and valued friends whom I should be glad to aid if I could.
Tens of thousands of the most happy families I have seen in India owe all they have to the able and judicious management of the late Colonel Ouseley when in the civil charge of the districts of Houshengabad and Baitool, in the Saugor territories; and no man’s memory is more dear to the people of those districts than his now is. The family of a man who had done so much to make his government beloved and respected over so large a field should never want if I could prevent it; but I have no situations whatever in my gift, nor have I any influence over any persons who have such situations to bestow.
Believe me,
Yours truly,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Harrington.
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Lucknow, 24th November 1851.
My Lord,
Lucknow affairs are now in a state to require the assumption of the entire management of the country; and the principal question for your Lordship’s consideration is, whether this shall be done by a new treaty or by simple proclamation. Treaties not only justify but enjoin the measure; our pledges to the people demand it; and all India are, I believe, satisfied of its justice, provided we leave the revenues for the maintenance of the royal family in suitable dignity, and for the benefit of the people.
We may disencumber our Government of the pay of two regiments of Oude Local Infantry, and incorporate them with the Oude force to be raised, and of that of the officers of the residency, altogether about two lacs and a-half of rupees; and when things are settled down a little, the brigade now here–of three infantry regiments and a company of artillery, costing some four lacs more–may be dispensed with, perhaps.
If I may be permitted to give an opinion as to the best mode of the two, I should say proclamation, as the more dignified.
I have prepared all the information I believe your Lordship will require, and am ready to wait upon you with it when and where it may seem most convenient.
The treasury is exhausted, and fifty lacs are required to pay the stipendiaries of the royal family and establishments; and assuredly all the members of that family, save the King’s own household, are wishing for some great measure to place them under the guarantee of the British Government. The people all now wish for it, at least all the well-disposed, for there is not a man of integrity or humanity left in any office. The King’s understanding has become altogether emasculated; and though he would not willingly do harm to any one, he is unable to protect any one. He would now, I believe, willingly get rid of his minister; and, having exhausted the treasury, the minister would not much dislike to get rid of him. I shall do my best to prevent his being released from the responsibility of his misdoings till I meet your Lordship. I should like, if possible, to meet your Lordship where there is likely to be the least crowd of expectants and parade to take up your time and distract your attention. If at Cawnpore, I hope you will permit me to have my camp on the Oude side of the river, with a tent in your camp for business during the day. With your Lordship’s commands to attend, it will be desirable to have an order to make over my treasury to the First Assistant, to prevent delay. Should you desire any memoranda to be sent, they shall be forwarded as soon as ordered. If any further public report upon the state of Oude affairs appears to be required, I must pray your Lordship to let me know as soon as convenient. I shall not propose any native gentlemen for the higher offices; but it will be necessary to have a great many in the subordinate ones, to show that your Lordship wishes to open employment in all branches of the new administration to educated native gentlemen.
I remain,
Your Lordship's obedient servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, Governor-General, &c. &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 18th March, 1852.
My Lord,
I was favoured with your Lordship’s letter of the 24th ultimo in due course, and did not reply immediately as I had stated, or was about to state, in a public form, all that seemed to be required about Captain Bird and Dr. Bell. Dr. Bell had apologised for indiscretions in conversation, but denied ever having authorised Mr. Brandon to make use of his name; and pretended utter ignorance of the intrigues which he was carrying on at the time that he was doing his utmost to convey wrong impressions to the Durbar. I feel grateful for the support your Lordship has given me. I cared nothing about the intrigues of these very silly men while under the impression that it was your intention to interpose effectually for the benefit of the people of Oude, because the new arrangements would have rendered them harmless; but when I found that you could not do so at present, it became necessary, for my own dignity and that of the Government, to do my best to put a stop to them. Most assuredly Captain Bird had been trying hard to persuade the King and his minister that our Government could not interfere, and that all the threats of the Governor-General would continue to be what they had hitherto been, and might be disregarded.
I find that your Lordship has departed slightly from your original plan in regard to Burmah, by sending a detachment to make a demonstration upon Rangoon and Martaban. There is no calculating upon the result of such a demonstration in dealing with a Government so imbecile, and so ignorant of our resources. The places are too far from the capital, and the war party may succeed in persuading the King that in this demonstration we put forth all our strength. I can appreciate your motive–the wish to avoid, if possible, a war of annexation, which a war upon any scale must be. We should have to make use of a vast number of suffering people, whom we could not abandon to the mercy of the old Government.
In the last war our great difficulties were the want of quick transit for troops and stores by sea, the want of carriage cattle, and sickness. These three impediments will not now beset us. Our own districts on the coast will supply land-carriage, steam-vessels will carry our troops and stores, and subsequent experience will enable us to avoid sources of endemial diseases. I have no map of the country; but some letters in the papers about the Busseya river interested me much. Our strong point is steam; and the discovery of a river which would enable us to use it in getting in strength to the rear or flank would be of immense advantage. There must be healthy districts; indeed Burmah generally must be a healthy country, or the population would not be so strong and intelligent as they are known to be. In religious feeling they are less opposed to us than any other people not Buddhists. Indeed, from the people we should have nothing to fear; and the army must be insignificant in numbers as well as equipments. I am very glad to find that so able and well-trained a statesman as Fox Maule has been put at the head of the Board of Control; and trust that your Lordship will remain at our head till the Burmah affair is thoroughly settled.
The little affair of the Moplars, on the Malabar coast, may grow into a very big one unless skilfully managed. A brother of the Conollys is the magistrate, I believe. We can learn nothing of the cause of the strong feeling of discontent that prevails among this fanatical people. No such strong feeling can exist in India without some “canker-worm” to embitter the lives and unite the sympathies of large classes against their rulers or local governors, and make them think that they cannot shake it off without rebelling and becoming martyrs. I must pray your Lordship to excuse this long rambling letter, and
Believe me, with great respect,
Your obedient servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, Governor-General, Calcutta.
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Lucknow, 4th April, 1852.
My Dear Sir James,
Your present of the cadetship for her son made the poor widow’s heart glad, and I doubt not that she has written to express her grateful feelings. The young man will, I hope, prove himself deserving of the favour you have conferred upon him so gracefully. The Court has called for a copy of my Diary of the tour I made through Oude soon after I took charge of my office; and I have sent off two copies, one for Government and the other for the Court. I purchased a small press and type for the purpose of printing it in my own house, that no one but myself and the compositor might see it. I will send home two copies for yourself and the chairman as soon as they can be bound in Calcutta. The Diary contains a faithful picture of Oude, its Government, and people, I believe. I have printed only a few copies, and they will not be distributed till I learn that the Court consider them unobjectionable. In spirit they will be found so. I intend, if I can find time, to give the history of the reigning family in a third volume. My general views on Oude affairs have been given in my letters to Government, which will, I conclude, be before the Court. A ruler so utterly regardless of his high duties and responsibilities, and of the sufferings of the people under his rule, as the present King, I have never seen; nor have I ever seen ministers so incompetent and so unworthy as those whom he employs in the conduct of his affairs. We have threatened so often to interpose for the benefit of the poor people, without doing anything, that they have lost all hope, and the profligate and unprincipled Government have lost all fear. The untoward war with Burmah prevents our present Governor-General from doing what he and I believe the Honourable Court both wish. We certainly ought not any longer to incur the odium of supporting such a Government in its iniquities, pledged as we are by treaties to protect the people from them. I do not apprehend any serious change in the constitution of the Court of Directors in the new charter. No ministers would hazard such a change in the present state of Europe. The Court is India’s only safeguard. No foreign possession was ever so governed for itself as India has been, and this all foreigners with whom I have conversed, admit. The Governor- General of the Netherlands India was with me lately on his way home. He is a first-rate statesman, and he declared to me that he was impressed and delighted to see a country so governed, and apparently so sensible of the benefits conferred upon it by our paternal rule. He will tell you the same thing if you ever meet him. His name is Rochasson. The people appreciate the value of the Court of Directors, and no act, as far as it is known to them, has tended more to strengthen their confidence in it than that which has brought retribution on the great sinner in Scinde, Allee Murad. No punishment was ever more just or merited. Scinde, however, is too remote for the people in general to feel much interest in its affairs or families. Our weak points in the last Burmese war were:–1. The want of transport for troops and stores; 2. The want of carriage by land, for arms and stores; 3. Sickness. All these things have been remedied, and the war, when begun in earnest, can last but a short time. We know more of the country and shall avoid the sources of endemial disease; our steam provides for the rapid transport of troops and stores; and draft-cattle will be supplied from our own districts on the coast. Where our Government has no representative as Resident or Consul, all Europeans should be told that they remain entirely on their own responsibility. Unless this is done, the Governments must be eternally in collision. If war be carried on in earnest, it must be one of annexation: we must make use of persons whom we cannot abandon to the mercy of the Burmese Government. We have nothing to fear from the people: they have no religious feeling against us, being all Buddhists; and they have seen too much of the benefits conferred by us on the territories taken during the last war to have any dead of our dominion. Lord Dalhousie has, I believe, been most anxious to avoid a war–it has been forced upon him.
Believe me,
Yours very faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James W. Hogg, Deputy Chairman, India House.
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Lucknow, 6th April, 1842.
My Dear Mr. Halliday,
We are all wrong here in the Martinière institution, and you have now an admirable opportunity of setting all right and doing an infinite deal of good with little trouble. I know how little you have of time and attention to devote to such things, and conclude that Mr. Devereux cannot have much more, and you may feel assured that I shall do all in my power to assist you. We are here attempting to give the education of gentlemen to beggar-boys, who must always depend upon their daily work for their daily bread. The senior boys are in despair, for they find that they have learnt hardly anything to fit them for the only employments open to them, and this tends to discourage the younger ones. The Roorkee Civil Engineering School seems to have been eminently successful, and a fine field is open to all who are taught in it. We shall no doubt have a similar field open in Oude when Government interposes in behalf of the suffering people, and we might prepare for it by converting the Martinière into a similar school or college. The committee has just expressed to you a hope that Mr. Crank, the officiating principal, may be able to pass an examination in the native languages. This hope can never be realised; and if he does I shall have to record my opinion that he is otherwise unfitted. The power of nominating a principal rests entirely with the trustees; and if you concur in my views you might at once prepare for the change by getting a man from England or elsewhere, such as Mr. Maclagan, the late superintendent of the Roorkee school, fitted to teach civil engineering in all its branches. You have the command of funds to provide him with assistants of all kinds; and we have accommodations and funds to raise more, and provide machinery, books, &c. The thing might be set going at once, after you send a competent man to superintend it; and the work will be honourable to our Government and ourselves, and of vast benefit to the boys brought up at this Martinière, and to their parents and families. If you think favourably of the proposed change, and will direct the committee to take it into consideration, I will do my best to make it respond cordially to your call; or if you direct the measure to be adopted at once, I will see that it is worked out as it should be. Mr. Crank has a good knowledge of mathematics and mechanics, and will make a good second under a good first; but he would be quite unfit for a first. Mr. Maclagan intended going home, via Bombay, as soon as relieved by Captain Oldfield, and has embarked by this time. He might be written to, to send out a competent person and the required machinery. Constantia is admirably adapted for such an establishment; the river Goomtee flows close under it; the grounds are ample, open, and level, and the climate fine. It would interest the whole of the Oude aristocracy, and induce them to send their sons there for instruction. It would be gratifying to the Judges of the Supreme Court to know that the funds available were devoted to a purpose so highly useful; and you would carry home with you the agreeable recollection of having engrafted so useful a branch upon the almost useless old trunk of the Martinière.
Yours very truly,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To F. J. Halliday, Esq. Secretary to Government, Calcutta.
Mr. Maclagan is a Lieutenant of Engineers, and lives in Edinburgh.
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Lucknow. 10th April, 1852.
My Lord,
In September 1848, I took the liberty to mention to your Lordship my fears that the system of annexing and absorbing native States–so popular with our Indian service, and so much advocated by a certain class of writers in public journals–might some day render us too visibly dependent upon our native army; that they might see it, and that accidents might occur to unite them, or too great a portion of them, in some desperate act. My only anxiety about Burmah arises from the same fears. Our native army has been too much petted of late; and they are liable to get into their heads the notion that we want them more than they want us. Had the 38th been at first ordered to march to Aracan, they would, in all probability, have begged their European officers to pray Government to permit them to go by water.
We committed a great mistake in not long ago making all new levies general service corps; and we have committed one not less grave in restricting the admissions into our corps to high-caste men: and encouraging the promotion of high-caste men to the prejudice of men equally deserving but of lower caste. The Brahmins in regiments have too much influence, and they are at the bottom of all the mischief that occurs. The Rajpoots are too numerous, because they are under the influence of the Brahmins, and feel too strong from their numbers.
We require stronger and braver men than the Madras Presidency can afford, with all their readiness for general service. The time may not be distant when England will have to call upon India for troops to serve in Egypt; and the troops from Madras, or even from Bombay, will not do against Europeans. Men from Northern or Western India will be required, and, in order to be prepared, it would be well to have all new corps–should new corps be required–composed of men from the Punjaub or the Himmalayah chain, and ready for any service. Into such corps none but Seiks, Juts, Goojurs, Gwalas, Mussulmans, and Hillmen should be enlisted. Too much importance is attached to height, merely that corps may look well on parade. Much more work can be got out of moderate sized than tall men in India. The tall men in regiments always fail first in actual service–they are fit only for display at reviews and on parades: always supposing that the moderate-sized men are taken from Western and Northern India, where alone they have the strength and courage required.
No recruit should henceforward be taken except on condition of general service; and by-and-by the option may be given to all sipahees, of a certain standing or period of service, to put their names down for general service, or retire. This could not, of course, be done at present. No commanding officer can say, at present, what his regiment will do if called upon to aid the Government in any way not specified in their bond. They have too commonly favourites, who persuade them, for their own selfish purposes, that their regiments will do anything to meet their wishes, at the very time that these regiments are watching for an occasion to disgrace these favourites by refusal. I have known many occasions of this. None but general service corps or volunteers should be sent to Burmah from Bengal during this campaign, or we shall hazard a disaster. There are, I believe, several that your Lordship has not yet called upon. They should be at hand as soon as possible, and their present places supplied by others. In the mean time, corps of Punjaubies and Hillmen should be raised for general service. Not only can no commanding officer say what his corps will do under circumstances in which their religion or prejudices may afford a pretext for disobedience, but no officers can say how far their regiments sympathise with the recusant: or discontented, corps, and are prepared to join them.
In case it should ever be proposed to make all corps general service corps, in the way I mention, a donation would, of course, be offered to all who declined of a month’s pay for every year of past service, or of something of that kind. A maximum might be fixed of four, five, or six months. It would not cost much, for but few would go. I must pray your Lordship to excuse the liberty I take in obtruding my notions on this subject, but it really is one of vital importance in the present state of affairs in India, as well as in Europe.
With great respect, I remain, &c.,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Moat Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T. Governor-General of India, Calcutta.
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Memorandum.
In the year 1832 or 1833 the want of bamboos of large size, for yokes for artillery bullocks, was much felt at Saugor and the stations of that division; and the commissariat officer was authorised to form a bamboo grove, to be watered by the commissariat cattle, in order to supply the deficiency for the future. Forty beegas, or about twenty acres of land, were assigned for the purpose, and Government went to the expense of forming twelve pucka-wells, as the bamboos were planted upon the black cotton-soil of Central India, in which kutcha- wells do not stand. The first outlay was, therefore, greater than usual, being three thousand rupees. The establishment kept up consisted of one gardener, at five rupees a month, and two assistants at three rupees each. The bamboos were watered by the artillery bullocks and commissariat servants.
In a few years the bamboos became independent of irrigation, and no outlay has since been incurred upon them. The bamboos are now between forty and fifty feet high, and between four and five inches in diameter. They are used by the commissariat and ordnance departments at Saugor, but are not, I believe, required for yokes for the artillery bullocks.
There is a grove of sesum trees near the Lucknow cantonments formed in the same way, but with little or no outlay in irrigation. The trees were planted, and all the cost incurred has been in the people employed to protect them from trespass. In a dryer climate they might require irrigation for a few years. Groves of saul, alias sukhoo trees, might be formed in the same manner in the vicinity of all stations where there are artillery bullocks; and the bullocks themselves would benefit by being employed in the irrigation. The establishments kept up for the bullocks would be able to do all the work required.
The complement of bullocks for a battery of 6 guns, 6 waggons, and 2 store carts, is 106. The number yoked to each gun and waggon is 61, [transcriber’s note, should be 6], and to each cart 4, leaving a surplus of 26 for accidents. There would, therefore, be always a sufficient number of bullocks available for the irrigation of such groves where such a battery is kept up. These bullocks are taken care of by 4 sirdars and 59 drivers; and an European sergeant of artillery is appointed as bullock-sergeant to each battery, to superintend the feeding, cleaning, &c. &c. The officer on duty sees the bullocks occasionally, and the commanding officer sometimes. Such groves might be left to the care of the commandant of artillery at small stations, and to the commissariat officer at large ones.
At every large station there might be a grove of sesum, one of sakhoo, and one of bamboos, each covering a hundred acres; and at all stations with a battery, three groves of the same kind, covering each twenty acres or more. For the convenience of carriage by water, such groves might be formed chiefly in the vicinity of rivers, or in that of the places where the timber is most likely to be required; but no battery should be without such groves. The men and bullocks would both benefit by the employment such groves would give them. The men, to interest them, might each have a small garden within the grove which he assists in watering.
Such groves would tend to improve the salubrity of the stations where they are formed, and become agreeable and healthful promenades for officers and soldiers. In most stations, kutcha-wells, formed at a cost of from 20 to 50 rupees, would suffice for watering such groves. They might be lined, like those of the peasantry, by twisted cables of straw and twigs; and the men who attend the bullocks might be usefully employed in weaving them, as all should learn to make fascines and gabions. Willows should be planted near all the wells, to supply twigs for making the cables for lining the wells, and the manure of the artillery draft-bullocks should be appropriated to the groves.
[Submitted to the Governor-General through the Private Secretary, in March, 1852, with reference to a conversation which I had with his Lordship in his camp.]
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Lucknow, 23rd August, 1852.
My Lord,
Permit me to offer my congratulations, not only on the success which has hitherto attended your Lordship’s arrangements in Burmah, but on the very favourable impression which that success has made upon the Sovereign and people of England. It has enabled you to show that the war is not with the people of Burmah, but with a haughty, insolent, and incompetent Government, with whom that people has no longer any sympathy; and that, should circumstances render the annexation of any portion of its territory necessary, the people of that portion would consider the measure a blessing, and be well pleased to live in harmony under the efficient protection of the new rule.
They are not in any way opposed to us from either religions or political feelings, for they seem to consider Christianity as a branch only of their own great system of Buddhism, which includes almost half of the human race; and they are evidently weary of the political institutions under which they now live, and which have ceased to afford them protection of any kind. In the annexation of Pegu–should it be forced upon your Lordship–there would be nothing revolting to the feelings of its people or to those of the people of England; on the contrary, both would be satisfied, after the disposition the people of Pegu have manifested towards us, that the measure was alike necessary to their security and to the honour and interest of our Government.
Nor do I think that there would be any ground to apprehend that the resources of the territory taken would not, after a time, be sufficient to defray the costs of the establishments required to retain and govern it. Among the people of Pegu we should find men able and willing to serve us faithfully and efficiently in both our civil and military establishments, and the drain for the maintenance of foreigners would not be large. I have heard the mental and physical powers of the men of Pegu spoken of in the highest terms by persons who have spent the greater part of their lives among them; and a country which produces such men cannot be generally insalubrious. This early demonstration has enabled your Lordship to ascertain and expose the determination of the Government of Ava not to grant the redress justly demanded for wrongs suffered, so as to enlist on our side the sympathy of all civilized nations, and at the same time to discover the real weakness of the enemy and the facilities offered to us, in their fine rivers, for the use of our strong arm–the steam navy. Not a single “untoward event” has yet occurred to dispirit our troops, or give confidence to the enemy, or to prejudice the people of Burmah against us: and there certainly is nothing in this war to make us apprehend “that our political difficulties will begin when our military successes are complete.” It is not displeasing to perceive the strong tendency to an early onward move, while your Lordship has so prudent a leader in General Godwin to restrain it within due bounds.
I remain, &c.,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T. Governor-General of India. Calcutta.
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Lucknow, September, 1852.
My Lord,
The longer the present King reigns, the more unfit he becomes to reign, and the more the administration and the country deteriorate. The State must have become bankrupt long ere this, but the King, and the knaves by whom he is governed, have discontinued paying the stipends of all the members of the royal family, save those of his own father’s family, for the last three years; and many of them are reduced to extreme distress, and without the hope of ever getting their stipends again unless our Government interferes. The females of the palaces of former sovereigns ventured to clamour for their subsistence, and they were, without shame or mercy, driven into the streets to starve, beg, or earn their bread by their labour. This deters all from complaining, and they are in a state of utter dismay. No part of the people of Oude are more anxious for the interposition of our Government than the members of the royal family; for there is really no portion more helpless and oppressed: none of them can ever approach the King, who is surrounded exclusively by eunuchs, fiddlers, and poetasters worse than either; and the minister and his creatures, who are worse than all. They appropriate at least one-half of the revenues of the country to themselves, and employ nothing but knaves of the very worst kind in all the branches of the administration. The King is a crazy imbecile, who is led about by these people like a child, and made to do whatever they wish him to do, and to give whatever orders may best suit their private interests. At present, the most powerful of the favourites are Decanut od Doula and Husseen od Doula, two eunuchs; Anees od Doula and Mosahib od Doula, two fiddlers; two poetasters, and the minister and his creatures. The minister could not stand a moment without the eunuchs, fiddlers, and poets, and he is obliged to acquiesce in all the orders given by the King for their benefit. The fiddlers have control over the administration of civil justice; the eunuchs over that of criminal justice, public buildings, &c. The minister has the land revenue; and all are making enormous fortunes. The present King ought not certainly to reign: he has wilfully forfeited all right to do so; but to set him aside in favour of his eldest, or indeed any other son, would give no security whatever for any permanent good government A well-selected regency would, no doubt, be a vast improvement upon the present system; but no people would invest their capital in useful works, manufactures, and trades, with the prospect of being handed over a few years hence to a prince brought up precisely in the same manner the present King was, and as all his sons will be. What the people want, and most earnestly pray for is, that our Government should take upon itself the responsibility of governing them well and permanently. All classes, save the knaves, who now surround and govern the King, earnestly pray for this–the educated classes, because they would then have a chance of respectable employment, which none of them now have; the middle classes, because they find no protection or encouragement, and no hope that their children will be permitted to inherit the property they may leave, not invested in our Government securities; and the humbler classes, because they are now abandoned to the merciless rapacity of the starving troops, and other public establishments, and of the landholders, driven or invited into rebellion by the present state of misrule. There is not, I believe, another Government in India so entirely opposed to the best interest’s and most earnest wishes of the people as that of Oude now is; at least I have never seen or read of one. People of all classes have become utterly weary of it. The people have the finest feelings towards our Government and character. I know no part of India, save the valley of the Nurbuddah, where the feeling towards us is better. All, from the highest to the lowest, would, at this time, hail the advent of our administration with joy; and the rest of India, to whom Oude misrule is well known, would acquiesce in the conviction, that it had become imperative for the protection of the people. With steamers to Fyzabad, and a railroad from that place to Cawnpore, through Lucknow, the Nepaul people would be for ever quieted, with half of the force we now keep up to look after them; and the N. W. Provinces become more closely united to Bengal, to the vast advantage of both. I mentioned that we should require a considerable loan to begin with; but I think that an issue of paper money, receivable in Oude in revenue, and payable to public establishments in Oude, might safely be made to cover all the outlay required to pay off odd establishments and commence the new work. Little money goes out of Oude, and the increased circulating medium, required for the new public works and new establishments, would soon absorb all the paper issued. It might be issued at little or no cost by the financial department of the new administration. Though everybody knows that the King has become crazy and imbecile, it would be difficult to get judicial proof that he is so, where the life and property of every one are at his mercy and that of the knaves who now govern him. His every-day doings sufficiently manifest it. There is not the slightest ground for hope that he will ever be any other than what he now is, or that his children will be better. There are too many interested in depriving them of all capacity for a part in public affairs that they may retain the reins in their own hands when the children come of age to admit of their ever becoming better than their father is. I have not lately made the reports which Lord Hardinge directed the Resident to make periodically, but shall be prepared to resume them whenever your Lordship may direct. I suspended them on account of hostilities with Burmah. I have printed eighteen copies of the establishments, as they are and were last year, and as I proposed for the new system. I shall not let any one have a copy till your Lordship permits it, and they are all at your disposal if required. This, and the “Substantive Code,” are the only papers connected with Oude, except the Diary that I have had printed, or shall have printed, unless ordered by you.
I remain, with great respect,
Your Lordship's obedient servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
P.S.–I believe that it is your Lordship’s wish that the whole of the revenues of Oude should be expended for the benefit of the royal family and people of Oude, and that the British Government should disclaim any wish to derive any pecuniary advantages from assuming to itself the administration.
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T. Governor-General, &c. &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 21st September, 1852.
My Dear Sir,
I will reply to the queries contained in your letter of the 16th instant to the best of my recollection. I was in Calcutta in January, 1838, when the late Dyce Sombre was there, and about to embark for England. I had seen a good deal of him at Sirdhanah, in March 1836, soon after the Begum Sumroo’s death, and he afterwards spent a short time with me at Mussoorie, and consulted me a good deal on the subject of a dispute with his father.
Colonel James Skinner and Dr. Drener were, I believe, executors to his will. Colonel Skinner was at Delhi, and Dr. Drener had either gone home or was going, I forget which, and Dyce Sombre asked me to consent to become one of his trustees, for the conduct of his affairs in this country. I consented, and I think the circumstance was inserted in a codicil or memorandum added to his will or deed; but my recollection on this point is not distinct.
I had, however, nothing to do with the conduct of his affairs in this country until the death of Colonel James Skinner, which took place in December, 1841, when Mr. Reghilini, the overseer or agent at Sirdhanah, got my sanction to the outlay for establishments, &c. At this time I corresponded with Dyce Sombre, and continued to do so until his affairs were thrown into Chancery. I then sought a lawyer’s opinion as to my proper course, and refused to give Mr. Reghilini any further orders. The opinion was, “that my only safe course was to do nothing whatever in the conduct of his affairs;” and I never afterwards did anything. I never heard of any Colonel Sheerman, and his name may have been inserted by mistake for mine; but I was then (1838) only a major, and was not promoted until 1843. I never heard of any desire on the part of Dyce Sombre, or the Begum Sumroo, to found a college other than as an appendage to the Sirdhanah church, nor of his having given the residue of his property for the purpose; at least, I have no recollection of having heard of such desire. I always hoped, and expected, until I heard of his marriage, that he would return and reside at Sirdhanah.
Dyce Sombre always spoke to me of Mrs. Troup and Mrs. Soloroli as his sisters: he regarded them alike as such, and so did the Begum Sumroo. I always understood them to be the children of the same mother; but the question was never mooted before me, and I have always heard that Mrs. Troup was very like Dyce Sombre in appearance, and that Mrs. Soloroli was not so.
Mr. Reghilini, who is, I believe, still at Sirdhanah, may know whether a Colonel Sheerman was appointed executor or not. Dr. Drener must know. The notes which passed between me and Dyce Sombre, after he left India, were on the ordinary topics of the day, and were destroyed as soon as read. I have none of them to refer to, nor would they furnish any confirmation on the matter in question if I had.
Believe me, yours, very truly,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
Charles Prinsep, Esq., Barrister-at-Law, Calcutta.
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To Messrs. Molloy, Mackintosh, and Poe, Calcutta.
Dear Sirs,
In reply to your letter of the 16th instant, I enclose the copy of a letter addressed by me on the 21st ultimo to Mr. Charles Prinsep, in reply to similar queries. To what I stated in that letter I can add but little.
Dyce Sombre always spoke to me of Mrs. Soloroli and Mrs. Troup as his sisters, and of the former as the eldest of the two; and Mrs. Troup spoke of Mrs. Soloroli as her eldest sister. They were always treated by the Begum Sumroo as his sisters; and when Dyce Sombre went to England I think he left the same provision for both in addition to what they had received from the Begum.
I was introduced to Mrs. Troup by her husband as an old friend on my way back from Mussoorie in November, 1837, but I did not see Mrs. Soloroli, though she and her husband were at the same place, Sirdhanah, at that time. They both lived under the curtain, secluded from the sight of men, after the Hindoostanee fashion, as long as they remained in India, I think; and I was introduced to Mrs. Troup as a friend of the family, whom all might require to consult. Her husband only was present during the interview. Dyce Sombre had left the place for Calcutta. I never heard a doubt expressed of their being sisters by the same mother and father till the new will came under discussion at the end of last year.
I may refer you to pages 378 and 396 of the second volume of a work by me, entitled “Rambles and Recollections,” in which you will find it mentioned that the grandmother of Dyce Sombre died insane at Sirdhanah in 1838. She must have been insane for more than forty years up to her death. Her son Zuffer Yab Khan was a man of weak intellect, and he was the father of Dyce Sombre’s mother, of whom I know nothing whatever.
Dyce Sombre, showed no symptoms of derangement of mind while I knew him; but he inherited from his grandmother a predisposition to insanity, which I apprehended might become developed by any very strong feelings of excitement; and I urged him to return and settle at Sirdhanah, when he had seen all he wished to see in Europe.
He saw a good deal of English society in India, and understood well the freedom which English wives enjoy in general society; but I doubted whether he could ever thoroughly shake off his early predilections for keeping them secluded. It would, I thought, be always to him a source of deep humiliation to see his wife mix with other men in the manner in which English married ladies are accustomed to do. Since his affairs were put into Chancery I have always felt persuaded that this must have been the principal “exciting cause” acting upon the predisposition derived from his grandmother, which led to it. I have never had the slightest doubt that he suffered under an aberration of mind upon this point, though he never mentioned the subject in any of his short letters to me from England, nor did he in any of them show signs of such aberration.
Believe me, yours, faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
26th October, 1852.
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Lucknow, 28th October, 1852.
My Dear Sir James,
Your letter of the 6th ultimo reached me by the last mail, and I trust we shall see your hopes of an early renewal of the Charter with few alterations realised. I entirely concur with you in opinion that the power of recall is indispensable to the due authority of the Court; and was much surprised to find Maddock opposed to it. Many thinking men at home have been of opinion that the Ministers would secure for the Queen the nomination of a certain number to the Direction, on the ground that many of the best men from India are deterred from becoming candidates by the time and pledges required in the canvass. The late elections, however, seem to have come in time to increase the Jealousy of ministerial influence, and prevent such a measure.
Hostilities with Burmah have prevented my making public periodical reports to Government about Oude affairs since I submitted my Diary. I took the liberty to send, through my London agents copy to yourself and the Deputy Chairman. Things have not improved since it was written. The King is as regardless of his high duties and responsibilities as ever: he is, indeed, an imbecile in the hands of a few fiddlers, eunuchs, and poetasters, and the minister, who is no better than they are, and obliged to provide for all these men out of the revenues and patronage of the country, and sundry women about the Court, also, to secure their influence in his favour.
The King contrives to get the stipends of those immediately about him, and of his mother, brothers, and sisters, paid out of the revenues; but is indifferent about those of his more distant relatives, and hardly any of them have had any stipends for the last two and even three years. Those who happen not to have a little Company’s paper given to them by former Sovereigns, or pensions guaranteed by our Government and paid out of our Treasury, are starving, and pray for the day when our Government may interpose in the administration. The expenditure is much above the income, and the reserved treasury is exhausted; but the King has his jewels and some personal property in Government notes, derived from his father and grandmothers. He thinks himself the best of kings and the best of poets, and nothing will induce him willingly to alter his course or make room for a better ruler or better system.
If our Government interpose, it must not be by negotiation and treaty, but authoritatively on the ground of existing treaties and obligations to the people of Oude. The treaty of 1837 gives our Government ample authority to take the whole administration on ourselves, in order to secure what we have often pledged ourselves to secure to the people; but if we do this we must, in order to stand well with the rest of India, honestly and distinctly disclaim all interested motives, and appropriate the whole of the revenues for the benefit of the people and royal family of Oude. If we do this, all India will think us right, for the sufferings of the people of Oude, under the present system, have been long notorious throughout India; and so have our repeated pledges to relieve the people from these sufferings, unless the system should be altered. Fifty years of sad experience have shown to us and to all India, that this system is incapable of improvement under the present dynasty; and that the only alternative is for the paramount power to take the administration upon itself.
Under the treaty of 1801, we took one-half of the territory of Oude, and that half yields to us above two crores of rupees; though, when taken, it was estimated at one hundred and thirty-three lacs. The half retained by the Oude Sovereign was estimated at the same; but it now yields to the Sovereign only one crore. The rest is absorbed by the knaves employed in the administration and their patrons at Court. All that is now so absorbed would come to the Treasury under us, and be employed in the maintenance of efficient establishments, and the construction of useful public works; and we should have ample means for providing for all the members of the royal family of Oude.
We should derive substantial benefit from the measure, without in any degree violating our declaration of disinterestedness. We now maintain five regiments of Infantry, and a company of Artillery, at a cost of from five to six lacs a-year. We maintain the Residency and all its establishments at a cost of more than one lac of rupees a- year. All these would become fairly chargeable to the Oude revenues under the new administration; and we might dispense with half the military forces now kept up at Cawnpore and Dinapore on the Ganges, as the military force in Oude would relieve us from all apprehension as to Nepaul.
Oude would be covered with a network of fine macadamised roads, over which the produce of Oude and our own districts would pass freely to the benefit of the people of both; and we should soon have the river Ghagra, from near Patna on the Ganges, to Fyzabad in Oude, navigable for steamers: with a railroad from Fyzabad, through Lucknow to Cawnpore, to the great benefit of the North-West Provinces and those of Bengal.
Were we to take advantage of the occasion to annex or confiscate Oude, or any part of it, our good name in India would inevitably suffer; and that good name is more valuable to us than a dozen of Oudes. We are now looked up to throughout India as the only impartial arbitrators that the people generally have ever had, or can ever hope to have without us; and from the time we cease to be so looked up to, we must begin to sink. We suffered from our conduct in Scinde; but that was a country distant and little known, and linked to the rest of India by few ties of sympathy. Our Conduct towards it was preceded by wars and convulsions around, and in its annexation there was nothing manifestly deliberate. It will be otherwise with Oude. Here the giant’s strength is manifest, and we cannot “use it like a giant” without suffering in the estimation of all India. Annexation or confiscation are not compatible with our relations with this little dependent state. We must show ourselves to be high-minded, and above taking advantage of its prostrate weakness, by appropriating its revenues exclusively to the benefit of the people and royal family of Oude. We should soon make it the finest garden in India, with the people happy, prosperous, and attached to our rule and character.
We have at least forty thousand men from Oude in the armies of the three Residencies, all now, rightly or wrongly, cursing the oppressive Government under which their families live at their homes. These families would come under our rule and spread our good name as widely as they now spread the bad one of their present ruler. Soldiers with a higher sense of military honour, and duty to their salt, do not exist, I believe, in any country. To have them bound to us by closer ties than they are at present, would of itself be an important benefit.
I can add little to what I have said in the latter end of the fourth chapter of my Diary (from p. 187*, vol. ii.), on the subject of our relations with the Government of Oude; and of our rights and duties arising out of those relations. The diaries political, which I send every week or fortnight to the Government of India, are formed out of the reports made every day to the Durbar, by their local or departmental authorities. The Residency News-writer has the privilege of hearing these reports read as they come in; and though the reports of many important events are concealed from him, they may generally be relied upon as far as they go. The picture they give of affairs is bad enough, though not so bad as they deserve.
[* Transcriber’s note. From the text “By the treaty of 1801 we bound ourselves…….”–to the end of the chapter IV in vol. ii]
There are so many worthless and profligate people about the Court, interested in smothering any signs of common sense and good feeling on the part of the heir apparent to the throne, in order to maintain their ascendancy over him as he grows up, that he has not the slightest chance of becoming fit to take any part in the conduct of public affairs when he comes of age. The present King has three or four sons, all very young, but it is utterly impossible for any one of them to become a man of business; and it would be folly to expect any one of them to make a better Sovereign than their father. He is now only twenty-eight or twenty-nine years of age; but his understanding has become quite emasculated by over-indulgencies of all kinds. He may live long, but his habits have become too inveterate to admit of his ever becoming better than he now is or fit to be intrusted with the government of a country.
I shall recommend that all establishments, military, civil, and fiscal, be kept entirely separate from those of our own Government, that there may be no mistake as to the disinterestedness of our intentions towards Oude. The military establishments being like Scindiah’s contingent, in the Gwalior state, or the Hydrabad contingent in the Nizam’s. I estimate the present expenditure at, civil and fiscal establishments, and stipendiaries, 38 lacs. Military and police, 55. King’s household, 30. Total, 123 lacs. Establishments required for an efficient administration–civil and fiscal–at 22 lacs. Military, 26 lacs. Families and dependents of former Sovereigns, 12 lacs. Household of the Sovereign, his sons, brothers, and sisters, 15 lacs. Total, 75 lacs.
This would leave an abundant store for public works, military stores, contingent charges, pension establishments for the civil and military officers employed under us, &c. To pay off all the present heavy arrears of stipends, salaries, to provide arms, ammunition, and stores, and to commence upon all the public works, our Government would have either to give or guarantee a loan; or to sanction the issue of a certain amount of paper money, to circulate exclusively in Oude, by making it receivable in the Oude Treasuries in taxes.
The revenues would be at once greatly increased, by our taking for the treasury all that is now intercepted and appropriated by public officers and Court favourites for their own private purposes, by our making the great landholders pay a due portion of their assets to the state, and by our securing the safe transit of raw produce and manufactured goods to their proper markets.
By adopting a simple system of administration, to meet the wishes of a simple people, we should secure the goodwill of all classes of society in Oude; and no class would be more pleased with the change than the members of the royal family themselves, who depend upon their stipends for their subsistence, and despair of ever again receiving them under the present Sovereign and system.
I hope a happy termination of the present war with Burmah will soon leave Lord Dalhousie free to devote his attention to Oude affairs. As far as I am consulted, I shall advocate, as strongly as may be compatible with my position, the measures above described, because I think they will be found best calculated to benefit the people of Oude, to meet the wishes of the home Government, and to sustain his Lordship’s own reputation, and that of the nation which he represents throughout our Eastern empire.
You are aware of some of the difficulties that I have had to contend with, in carrying out important measures beneficial to the people, and honourable to the Government of India; but in no situation in life have I ever had to struggle with so many as here, in pursuing an honest and steady course of policy, calculated to secure the respect of all classes for the Government which I represent. Such a scene of intrigue, corruption, depravity, neglect of duty, and abuse of authority, I have never before been placed in, and hope never again to undergo; and I have had to contend with bitter hostility where I had the best right to expect support. I have never yet failed in the performance of any duty that Government has intrusted to me, and, under Providence, I hope that I shall ultimately succeed in the performance of that which I have committed to me here.
Lucknow is an overgrown city, surrounding an overgrown Court, which has, for the last half century, exhausted all the resources of this fine country; and so alienated the feelings of the great body of the people that they, and the Sovereign, and his officers, look upon each other as irreconcileable enemies. Between the city, the pampered Court and its functionaries, and the people of the country beyond, there is not the slightest feeling of sympathy; and if our troops were withdrawn from the vicinity of Lucknow, the landholders and sturdy peasantry of the country would, in a few days, rush in and plunder and destroy it as a source of nothing but intolerable evil to them.
Though I have written a long letter, I may have omitted many things which you wished me to notice. In that case I must rely upon your letting me know; and in the mean time, I shall continue to write whenever I have anything to communicate that is likely to interest you.
Believe me, dear Sir James,
Yours very faithfully,
W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James Weir Hogg, Bart. &c. &c. &c.
P.S. By treaty, we are bound to keep up a certain force near the capital for the protection of the Sovereign; and we should be obliged, till things were quite settled under the new system, to retain the brigade we now have of our regular troops in the cantonments, which are three miles from the city.
W. H. SLEEMAN.
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Lucknow, 20th November, 1852.
My Dear Sir James,
To be prepared for accidents, I deem it right to send a duplicate of the letter which I sent to you by the last mail, addressed to the care of my London agents, Messrs. Denny and Clark, Austin Friars. I have nothing new or interesting to communicate from Oude. The Burmese war seems likely to divert the Governor-General’s attention from Oude and Hydrabad affairs for some time to come; and the death of the Duke of Wellington, and probable changes in the ministry at home, may prevent him from venturing upon any important change in the Oude administration when that war closes.
The war is an “untoward event,” arising from a very small cause; and it should prevent our ever guaranteeing British subjects in countries where we have no accredited agents to conduct our relations with the Government. All such subjects, and all the subjects of our European and American allies, should in future be made to understand that they enter such countries entirely upon their own responsibility. Without some such precaution we must always be liable to be involved in war with bordering countries by adventurers of one land or another; and as war is almost always followed by annexation or confiscation, our Indian empire, like that of the Romans, must soon sink from its own weight. The people will think that we are perpetually seeking pretexts for war in order to get new territories, and the general or universal impression will be dangerous.
When the public press of England abuse those who have to conduct the present war for delay, they do not sufficiently consider our ignorance of the state of the rivers and of the military resources of the country in which it was to be carried on when we entered upon it. We did not know that the rivers were navigable, nor did we know how they were defended; nor did we know what forces Burmah could muster, nor how they were distributed. It was not intended to commence the war till after the rains, when it would be safe to move troops over the country; for it was not reasonable to suppose that the Government of the country could be so haughty and insolent without military force to support its pretensions, and we have often had sad experience of the danger of underrating the power of an enemy. The object of the earlier movement was merely to secure some points of support, at which to concentrate our forces as they came up, and not to advance at once on the capital or into the country at a season when no troops could move by land.
Our strong arm was, no doubt, the steam flotilla; but it would have been madness in us, with our ignorance of the rivers and resources of the country, to have calculated upon conquering Ava by steamers alone. With what we now know, people may safely say that General Godwin has failed to make all the use he might of the flotilla, as Lord Gough failed to make all the use he might of his “strong arm,” the artillery, in the battles of the Punjaub; but Lord Gough was not ignorant of the country in which he had to operate, nor of the resources of the country he had to contend with. According to previous calculations, the war ought not to have begun till this month. The earlier movement has, however, been of great advantage–it has taught us what the rivers and resources of the country are; and, what is of still more importance, what the people and their feelings towards their Government and ours are. It is manifest that they fully appreciate the value of the protection which the people, under our rule, enjoy; and that they have neither religious nor political feelings of hostility towards us; and that the people of Pegu, at least, would hail the establishment of our rule as a blessing.
You were so kind as to express a wish to see my son. He is now with his regiment, the 16th Lancers, in Ireland, and has lately obtained his Lieutenancy. He will be twenty years of age in January. I will make known to him your kind wish, and doubt not that he will pay his respects when he visits London.
Believe me, My Dear Sir James,
Yours very faithfully,
W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James Weir Hogg, Bart, &c. &c. &c.
P.S.–In page 217, line 4, vol. i., of my Diary, the printer has put “months” for weeks. Pray do me the favour to have this corrected.–W. H. S.
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My Lord,
Your Lordship’s wishes in regard to the papers on Oude affairs shall be strictly attended to. They are locked up in my box, and no one shall see them. I had no wish to print any but those I mentioned in my last letter, and they are locked up with the others, which I have not looked at since I left your Lordship’s camp; the Diary, excepted.
Things in Oude are just as they were; and the King’s ambition seems to be limited to the reputation of being the best drum-beater, dancer, and poet of the day. He is utterly unfit to reign; but he is himself persuaded that no man can be more fit than he is for anything, and he will never willingly consent to make over the reins of Government to any one. It would be impossible to persuade him to abdicate even in favour of his own son, much less to resign his sovereignty in perpetuity. If our Government interpose, it must be by the exercise of a right derived from the existing relations between the two Governments, or from our position as the paramount power in India.
Of this your Lordship will have to consider and decide when your mind is relieved from Burmese affairs, which appear to be drawing very quietly to a close. I shall not write publicly about Oude affairs generally till I have your Lordship’s commands to do so. The Diary will continue to be transmitted regularly; but the Periodical General Report will be suspended.
Mr. Bushe remained a few days at Lucknow. He has since seen Agra, Bhurtpoor, and other places, and is now on his way back to Calcutta, well pleased with his tour.
With great respect,
Your Lordship's obedient Servant,
W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T., Governor-General of India.
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Lucknow, 2nd January, 1853.
My Dear Sir James,
I enclose two sets of Tables of Errata for the Diary, and must pray you to do me the favour to have one set put into the two volumes of the copy you have, and the other sent to the Deputy-Chairman for insertion in his copy. I did not take the liberty to send a copy to the President of the Board of Control, but if you think I should do so, I will.
The King of Oude is becoming more and more imbecile and crazy, and his servants continue more and more to abuse their power and neglect their duty. The King, every day manifests his utter unfitness to reign, in some new shape. He, on several occasions during the Mohurrum ceremonies which took place lately, went along the streets beating a drum tied round his neck, to the great scandal of his family and the amusement of his people. The members of his family have not been paid their stipends for from two to three years, and many of them have been reduced to the necessity of selling their clothes to purchase food. All classes, save the knaves who surround him, and profit by his folly, are become disgusted with and tired of him.
I do not interfere, except to protect our pledges and guarantees; and to conduct the current duties of the Residency in such a manner as to secure the respect of all classes for the Government which I represent. While the present King reigns, or has anything whatever to do with the Government, no interference could produce any substantial and permanent reform. The minister is a weak man and a great knave; but he has an influence over his master, obtained by being entirely subservient to his vices and follies, to the sacrifice of his own honour; and by praising all that he does, however degrading to him as a man and a sovereign.
Though the King pays no attention whatever to public affairs or to business of any kind, and aims at nothing but the reputation of being the best dancer, best versifier, and best drummer in his dominions, it would be impossible to persuade him that any man was ever more fit to reign than he is. Nothing would ever induce him willingly to abdicate even in favour of his own son, much less to make him willingly abdicate in perpetuity in favour of our Government, or make over the conduct of the administration to our Government. If, therefore, our Government does interfere, it must be in the exercise of a right arising out of the existing relations between the two States, or out of our position as the paramount power in India. These relations, under the Treaty of 1837, give our Government the right to take upon itself the administration, under present circumstances; and, indeed, imposes, upon our Government the duty of taking it: but, as I have already stated, neither these relations nor our position, as the paramount power, gives us any right to annex or to confiscate the territory of Oude. We may have a right to take territory from the Nizam of Hyderabad in payment for the money he owes us; but Oude owes us no money, and we have no right to take territory from her. We have only the right to interpose to secure for the suffering people that better Government which their Sovereign pledged himself to secure for them, but has failed to secure.
The Burmese war still prevents the Governor-General from devoting his attention to Oude and Hyderabad. In the last war we did not march our armies to the capital because we were not prepared to supply a new Government for the one which we should thereby destroy; and insurrection and civil war must have followed. Our conduct in that was wise and benevolent. When we moved our armies to Rangoon this time, we upset one Government without providing the people with another. The Governor-General could not provide for the Civil Government, because he could not know that the Government of Ava would force us to keep possession of any portion of its dominions; and taking upon ourselves the civil administration would compromise the people, should he have to give them up again to their old rulers. The consequence has been great suffering to a people who hailed us as deliverers. The folly of supposing that any country can be taken by steamers on their rivers alone has now become sufficiently manifest. The Governor-General has however, adopted the best possible measures for securing ultimate good government to Pegu. It would have been more easily effected had they been taken earlier, but this circumstance prevented.
There is a school in India, happily not yet much patronised by the Home Government nor by the Governor-General, but always struggling with more or less success for ascendancy. It is characterised by impatience at the existence of any native State, and its strong and often insane advocacy of their absorption–by honest means, if possible–but still, their absorption. There is no pretext, however weak, that is not sufficient, in their estimation, for the purpose; and no war, however cruel, that is not justifiable, if it has only this object in view. If you know George Clerk or Mr. Robertson, both formerly Governors of our North-West Provinces, they will describe to you the school I mean. They, I believe, with me, strongly deprecate the doctrines of this school as more injurious to India and to our interest in it, than those of any other school that has ever existed in India. Mr. George Campbell is one of the disciples of this school.–See the 4th chapter of his “Modern India.” The “Friend of India” is another, and all those whom that paper lauds most are also disciples of the same school. The Court of Directors will have to watch these doctrines carefully; and I wish you would speak to George Clerk and Mr. Robertson about them. They are both men of large views and sound judgment.
Believe me, My Dear Sir James,
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Sir James Weir Hogg, &c. &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 12th January, 1853.
My Dear Sir James,
I wrote to you on the 23rd October, 20th November, and the 2nd of this month; I mention this lest any of my letters miscarry; of the first letter I sent a duplicate on the 2nd, but I shall not send duplicates of the last two, or of this. I now write chiefly to call your attention to a rabid article in the “Friend of India,” of the 6th of this month, written by Mr. Marshman, when about to proceed to England, to become, it is said, one of the writers in the London “Times.” Of coarse, he will be engaged to write the Indian articles; and you will find him advocating the doctrines of the school mentioned in my last letter of the 2nd of this month. I consider their doctrines to be prejudicial to the stability of our rule in India, and to the welfare of the people, which depends on it. The Court of Directors is our only safeguard against these Machiavellian doctrines; and it may be rendered too powerless to stem them by the new arrangements for the Government of India. The objects which they propose for attainment–religion, commerce, &c.–are plausible; and the false logic by which they attempt to justify the means required to attain them, however base, unjust, and cruel, is no less so. I was asked by Dr. Duff, the editor of the “Calcutta Review,” before he went home to write some articles for that journal, to expose the fallacies, and to counteract the influences of the doctrines of this school; but I have for many years ceased to contribute to the periodical papers, and have felt bound by my position not to write for them. Few old officers of experience, with my feelings and opinions on this subject, now remain in India; and the influence of this school is too great over the rising generation, whose hopes and aspirations they tend so much to encourage. Mr. Elphinstone, Mr. Robertson, and George Clerk will be able to explain their danger to you. India must look to the Court of Directors alone for safety against them, and they will require the exertion of all its wisdom and strength.
Mr. Robertson will be able to tell you that, when I was sent to Bundelcund, in 1842, the feelings of the people of that province were so strongly against us, under the operation of the doctrines of this school, that no European officer could venture, with safety, beyond the boundary of a cantonment of British troops; and their servants were obliged to disguise themselves in order to pass from one cantonment to another. In a brief period, I created a feeling entirely different, and made the character of British officers respected and beloved. In the Gwalior territories the same result was obtained by the same means. However impulsive on other occasions, Lord Ellenborough behaved magnanimously after his victories over the Gwalior troops; but in sparing the State, he acted, I believe, against the feelings of his Council, amongst whom the doctrines of the absorbing, annexing, and confiscating schools prevailed; and the “Friend of India” condemned him, though the invasion was never justified, except on the ground of expediency. Had I, on these occasions, adopted the doctrines of the absorbing school, I might have become one of the most popular and influential men in India; but I should, at the same time, have rendered our rule and character odious to the people of India, and so far have injured our permanent interest in the country. I mention all this merely to show that my opposition to the doctrines of this school is not new, nor in theory only, but of long standing and practice, as far as my influence has extended. I deem them to be dangerous to our rule in India, and prejudicial to the best interests of the country. The people see that these annexations and confiscations go on, and that rewards and honorary distinctions are given for them, and for the victories which lead to them, and for little else; and they are too apt to infer that they are systematic, and encouraged, and prescribed from home. The native States I consider to be breakwaters, and when they are all swept away, we shall be left to the mercy of our native army, which may not always be sufficiently under our control. Such a feeling as that which pervaded Bundelcund and Gwalior in 1842 and 1843, must, sooner or later, pervade all India, if these doctrines are carried out to their full extent; and our rule could not, probably, exist under it. With regard to Oude, I can only say that the King pursues the same course, and every day shows that he is unfit to reign. He has not the slightest regard for the duties or responsibilities of his high position; and the people, and even the members of his own family, feel humiliated at his misconduct, and grow weary of his reign. The greater part of these members have not received their stipends for from two to three years, and they despair of ever receiving them as long as he reigns. He is neither tyrannical nor cruel, but altogether incapable of devoting any of his time or attention to business of any kind, but spends the whole of his time with women, eunuchs, fiddlers, and other parasites. Should he be set aside, as he deserves to be, three courses are open: 1. To appoint a regency during the minority of the heir-apparent, who is now about eleven years of age, to govern with the advice of the Resident; 2. To manage the country by European agency during the regency, or in perpetuity, leaving the surplus revenue to the royal family; 3. To confiscate and annex the country, and pension the royal family. The first plan was prescribed by Lord Hardinge, in case of accident to the King; the second is what was done at Nagpore, with so much advantage, by Sir Richard Jenkins in 1817; the third is what the absorbing school would advocate, but I should most deprecate. It would be most profitable for us, in a pecuniary point of view, but most injurious, I think, in a political one. It would tend to accelerate the crisis which the doctrines of that school must, sooner or later, bring upon us. Which course the Governor-General may prefer I know not.
Believe me,
My Dear Sir James,
Yours very faithfully
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN
To Sir James Weir Hogg, Bart., &c. &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 12th January, 1853.
My Dear Sir,
I shall send you by this mail a copy of my Diary under cover, addressed, as you suggest, to Mr. Secretary Melvill. It is coarsely bound, as I could find no good binder here. I printed eighteen copies, and have sent one to Government, in Calcutta, for itself, and one for the Court of Directors; one to the Governor-General, and one each to the Chairman and Deputy-Chairman. I have also sent one to a brother, and one to each of my five children. All to whom I have sent it of my family have been enjoined to consider it as private and confidential, and they will do so. Government may publish any portion of it they please. A memorandum of errata has been added to the copy to be sent to you.
Over and above what you justly observe as to the cultivation and population not being much diminished, and the State not having incurred any public debt, I may mention the fact noticed, I believe, somewhere in the Diary, that the landed aristocracy of the half of Oude, reserved in 1801, has been better preserved than that of the half made over to us. Had they not combined generally against the Government, they would all have been crushed ere this, as ours have been. This makes me mention a school of too much influence in India, of whose doctrines I have a great abhorrence. They are best expounded by the so-called “Friend of India,” in the last number of which (6th January, 1851) there is a rabid article on the subject worthy of your perusal, and that of all men interested in the welfare of India and the stability of our rule over it. It is in the true Machiavellian spirit, which justifies, or would persuade the world to justify, every means, however base, dishonest, and cruel, required to attain any object which they have persuaded themselves to be desirable for ourselves. This school is impatient at the existence of any native principality in India, however related to or dependent upon us. Mr. George Campbell is a disciple of this school, almost as rabid as the “Friend of India,” as you will see in the fourth chapter of his book on “Modern India.” If Mr. Marshman is to write the Indian articles for the “Times,” as reports give out, you will see these doctrines advocated in that influential journal. The Court of Directors is the only safeguard of India, and of our stability in it, against those doctrine which, in my opinion, tend strongly to the injury of both; and its power may be rendered too powerless to shun them.
Believe me,
My Dear Sir,
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Colonel Sykes, Director Hon. East India Company, London.
P.S.–I have felt much interested in the geology of Central and Southern India; and if you have seen any satisfactory account of the origin of the stratum which caps the basaltic plateau, shall feel obliged if you will point it out to me.
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Lucknow, 24th April, 1853.
My Dear Sir,
By the last mail I received from a friend in London two articles, whose merits had been much canvassed at the clubs, one from the London “Times,” of the 9th February, and the other from the “Daily News,” a Manchester paper. The “Times” article must have been written by Mr. J. Marshman, or one of the most rabid members of the school of which he is the great organ, and whose chief characteristic is impatience at the existence of any native territorial chief or great landholder in India. The other article is a reply to it, and generally supposed to have been written by Sir George Clerk. I feel quite sure that it was written either by him or by Mr. T. C. Robertson, who preceded him in the government of our North-West Provinces. The article from the “Times” has been noticed in most of the Indian papers–the “Friend of India,” April 7th, 1853, and the “Englishman,” 15th April. But I have not seen that in the “Daily News” noticed in any Indian papers, though admirably written. I intended to send it to you, but have mislaid it. I think you can advocate the cause it adopts more consistently, more powerfully, and more wisely than any other editor now in India. I hope you will do so; for I consider the doctrines of the “Times” disgraceful to our morality, and dangerous to the stability of our rule. As I consider the welfare of the people of India to depend upon the stability of our rule, I am very anxious to see the fallacies of the atrocious doctrines which endanger it ably exposed. In no publication are these fallacies more obvious or more numerous than in Mr. George Campbell’s “Modern India,” chapter fourth, with, perhaps, the exception of the “Friend of India.” With the “Friend,” the theory of confiscation and annexation has become a disease, and he cannot praise or even tolerate any public officer or statesman who is not known to be a convert to the doctrines of this school.
I forget the date of the “Daily News” in which Sir George Clerk’s article appeared, but it was immediately after the article appeared in the London “Times” of the 9th February. I hope you will give the article a prominent place in your paper, for it really deserves to be printed in letters of gold. Though I feel that the character of our nation, and our safety in India, are compromised by the open avowal of such atrocious doctrines in our leading journals, still the orders against officers in political employ writing in the papers are so strict, that I dare not attempt to expose the fallacies on which they are based, or express the indignation which they excite in me, in any public paper. To my superiors, and in the discharge of my public duties, I shall never cease to express my abhorrence of such doctrines, for I look upon them as worse than any that Machiavelli ever wrote.
Believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To G. Buist, Esq.
P.S.–Of course, this note will be considered as confidential.
(Signed) W. H. S.
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Lucknow, 24th April, 1853.
Dear Sir,
An article in your paper of the 15th instant, on the subject of the international law of India, has interested and pleased me much. It has reference to an article in the London “Times” of the 9th February last; and I write to invite your attention to an article which appeared in the “Daily News,” a Manchester paper, in reply to it, written by Sir G. Clerk, lately Governor of Bombay. Both these articles have been much discussed at the London clubs, and the morality of the “Daily News” article has been very favourably contrasted with that of the article in the “Times.” The article in the “Times” is supposed to have been penned by Mr. J. Marshman himself, or by one of the most rabid members of the school whose Machiavellian doctrine he advocates.
These doctrines are considered by some of our wisest statesmen to be as dangerous to the stability of our rule in India as they are disgraceful to our morality; and as these statesmen consider the well-being of the people of India to depend upon that stability, they are always glad to see their fallacies exposed and their iniquities indignantly denounced by the moat able and steady of our public journalists. I hope you will be able to find the able article in the “Daily News” to which I refer, and consent to give it a prominent place in the “Englishman.” It was sent to me by a friend in London, but I have, unfortunately, mislaid it. This note will, of course, be considered as confidential.
Yours sincerely,
W. H. SLEEMAN.
To W. C. Harry, Esq.
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Lucknow, 5th June, 1853.
My Lord,
I have read with great interest in the English journals your Lordship’s able Minute on the Burmese war, and am glad that it has been published, as it cannot fail to disabuse the public mind at home, and bring about a reaction in the feeling of the people excited by some very unfair articles in the London “Times.” I attributed these articles to the Napiers, who, however talented, are almost always wrong-headed.
I am persuaded that the new Sovereign will acquiesce in your possession of Pegu, and that he would not have ceded it by treaty under any circumstances. The old Sovereign might have done it, though at great risk, but the new Sovereign could not dare to do it.
Our own history affords us instances enough of powerful ministers anxious, for the public good, to get rid of conquered, but expensive and useless possessions, but deterred from proposing the measure by the dread of popular odium, which ambitious and factious rivals are always ready to excite.
There is one argument against the advance which I do not think that your Lordship has urged with the force of the rest. While the new Sovereign remains undisturbed in the rest of his dominions he will maintain his authority over them, and do his best to prevent our new frontier from being disturbed, knowing that we can advance to his capital and punish him if he does not. But, were he to be driven from his capital, all the rest of his dominions would soon fall into a state of anarchy, and our frontiers would soon be disturbed by leaders of disorderly bands, anxious to carve out principalities for themselves, and having no other means than plunder to maintain their followers. For the acts of such men we could hold no one responsible, after we had driven their Sovereign from his capital to the hills and jungles; and half a century might elapse before order could be restored. In the mean time, wealth would be growing up within our border to invite their aggression, while they would become poorer and poorer from disorders, and more and more anxious to seize upon it.
With regard to an advance upon Amarapoora, it will not be difficult after the rains, if circumstances render it necessary. The Madras cattle are much better for hard work and all climates than those of Bengal, and sufficient could be collected for the occasion by sea. Your Lordship’s reasons for not trusting to steamers alone are unanswerable, and it seems impossible for a land and river force to act jointly. In this, we almost realize the contest between the winds and the moschettoes before the court of the genii in the Arabian tale: when the winds appeared, the moschettoes could not, and when they appeared, the winds could not. For the prestige of our own name in the rest of India, to advance to the capital and then give the rest of the country to the Sovereign might, perhaps, be the best; but for the security of our new acquisition, and that of the people of the rest of Burmah, it would certainly be better to stay where we are. The benefits of our rule might, by degrees, be imparted to that of the rest of Burmah. The Government would be obliged to treat their people better than they have done in order to keep them.
Here everything still is what I have described it to be so often; that is, as bad as it can be. The King is the same, and the officers and favourites whom he employs are the same. I shall not write public reports on the state of affairs till I learn that your Lordship wishes it, which will be, I conclude, when you have carried out your arrangements in Burmah.
The terrible war of races in China, to which I have been looking forward for some years, seems to be coming slowly on. I wrote to Sir H. M. Elliot about it some two or three years ago, and recommended him to write a better life than we have of Jungez Khan, in order to show what the Tartars now really are. When he led his swarms of them over China, Central Asia, and a great part of Europe, they worshipped the god of war; they now worship the god of peace: but there are millions of Lamas in Tartary who would change their crosiers for the sword at the call of a kindred genius, and are now impatient to do so, and prophesying his advent, just at the time that the rebels threaten the capital of China and the extinction of the Tartar dynasty. That dynasty will throw itself upon Tartary, and a new one will be raised by the successful leader.
Your Lordship's faithful and obedient servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T., Governor-General.
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Lucknow, 24th June, 1853.
Dear Sir,
Your letter of the 20th instant perplexes me a good deal. I have no place in my own office to offer you, and I never recommended any one for employment to the King. You cannot, according to rules laid down for our guidance, act as an advocate in any case before the Resident or his assistants. All landholders in Oude, except the few whose estates are included in what is called the Hozoor Tuhseel, transact their business through the Amils, Chuckladars, and Nazims of districts, and have nothing to do directly with the Durbar at Lucknow. Having nothing to do with their affairs, I cannot have anything to say with the employment by them of wakeels, or advocates. They, the landholders, generally employ native wakeels, who are willing to bear a good deal of ill-treatment on the part of Durbar officials for the sake of very small salaries. Your situation as a wakeel on their part would be ill remunerated and exceedingly humiliating.
If the son of Ghalib Jung has offered to introduce you to the minister, and to assist in getting employment for you at Lucknow, he must, I think, do so in the hope of being able to make use of you in some intrigue; for those only who can aid in such intrigues are fostered and paid at Lucknow. Honest men can get nothing, and find no employment about the Court. If you secure employment about the Court, I cannot hold any communication with you. I should compromise myself by doing so. In your situation, I would rather be a section writer in Calcutta, or at Agra, than hold any employment in the Oude Durbar that you can get by honest means. One of the tasks imposed on you would be, I conclude, to praise bad persons and things, and abuse good, in the newspapers. This, of course, you would not do, and you would be punished accordingly. I strongly advise you to have nothing to do with Oude at present.
Yours very truly,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To G. Norton, Esq., Azimgurh.
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Lucknow, 11th August, 1853.
My Dear Sir,
Your brother, the late Lieut.-Colonel Ouseley, was a valued friend of mine. Before his appointment as Governor-General’s Agent of the south-eastern frontier districts, he had for many years held the civil charge of different districts in the Sangor and Nerbudda territories. I had for many years the civil charge of districts bordering on those under his charge, and abundant opportunity of seeing how much he had made himself beloved, and the character of his Government respected, by the manner in which he conducted the duties confided to him.
When I became Commissioner over those territories in 1844, I passed through the districts which had so long been under his charge, and I can honestly say that I have never known a man who had made himself more beloved and revered by the people. Thousands of happy families were proud to acknowledge that they owed all their happiness to the careful and liberal revision of the settlement of the land-revenue made by him, in which he had provided for the interests of the higher and middle classes connected with the land, while he secured the rights of the humblest.
I visited at the same time the districts of those territories which bordered upon his then charge of the south-east frontier, and communed with many people from that quarter. They all spoke of him as beloved and respected by all classes as much in his then charge as he had been in his old one. In a country where it is the duty of every Englishman to make the character of his Government and his nation respected and beloved, one cannot but feel proud to hear a countryman and fellow-labourer spoken of by tens of thousands of respectable, contented, and happy people as your brother was and still is. I know no part of India where the people of all classes and all grades are so attached to our character and our Government as that of the Saugor and Nerbudda territories, and I believe that no man did more to establish that fine feeling than your brother.
Your brother’s temper was warm, and he was not always happy in putting his thoughts and feelings to paper. Hence arose occasional misunderstandings with his official superiors. But while those superiors were men who could understand and appreciate his noble nature, such occasional misunderstandings never led to serious consequences. In the bitterness of his anguish, after his removal from the south-east frontier, he wrote to me; and it was most painful to me to feel that I was not in a position, or in circumstances, to advocate his cause, and describe the value of such a man as the representative of the Government and the national character among a wild and half-civilized people like those over whom he had been placed. I think it was on the representation of the late Mr. Launcelot Wilkinson, one of the most able and estimable members of the India Civil Service, that he was sent to the south-east frontier. He had seen his value in the Saugor and Nerbudda districts while he was political agent at Bhopaul, which bordered on the districts under your brother’s charge.
It has been to me a source of much regret that I have not had it in my power to aid his son in getting employment in India.
Believe me,
Yours very truly,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Major Ouseley, &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 14th September, 1853.
Dear Sir,
The King of Oude will certainly not assist you to get up a newspaper at Lucknow; and you will certainly be disappointed if you come in expectation of such assistance from him. If you can get into his service in any other capacity, I am not aware of any objections to it, but as I have already told you and many others, I cannot recommend any one for employment under him. The humiliations to which honest and respectable Christians have to submit in his service, from the jealousies of influential persons about the Durbar, are such as few can or ought to submit to; and I certainly would not advise any one to enter such a service. Under whatever pledge or whatever influence they might enter it, their tenure of office and their pay would be altogether precarious, and the Resident would be unable to assist them in retaining the one or recovering the other.
Yours faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To G. Norton, Esq.
P.S.–The King of Oude and his family are in no danger from the British Government, on whose good faith they repose. I only wish that his honest and industrious subjects were as safe from the officers whom he employs in all branches of the administration, and from whom they are nowhere safe I fear.
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
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Lucknow, 27th September, 1853.
My Dear James,
Under the circumstances you mention, I see but one course open to you; and that is, to recommend to the Government of Bombay to do as Lord William Bentinck did in the Bengal Presidency under similar circumstances, appoint a special Commissioner for the trial of offenders under Acts XX.[sic] of 1836, and XXIV. of 1843; or for the revision of trials under these Acts, conducted by Sessions' Judges.
The first would be the best if feasible; but the second would do, since the Sessions’ Judges seem now to be disposed to give their aid to Government in putting down the evil, and the Sudder Judges do not. Formerly, I believe, the Sudder Judges were so disposed, and the Sessions Judges not. In my reply to the Government of Bombay, you will see reference made to Lord William’s appointment of Mr. Stockwell as special Commissioner. He was at the time Commissioner of the Allahabad division, and the work was imposed upon him in addition to his other duties.
If the Bombay Government does not think it has authority to appoint such a special Commission, they may apply to the Legislative Council to pass an Act authorising the Government of every Presidency to appoint such a Commission when circumstances may render it necessary.
This will be better and safer than to frame and enforce new rules of evidence for the guidance of existing Judicial Courts. The one would be for a special emergency, and temporary; and Government would not be very averse to it; but the other they certainly would not venture upon, particularly at this time. A great fuss would be made about it here and at home; and lawyers are too influential in both places.
You can show that there is no alternative–that this system of crime must be left to prosper in the Bombay Presidency, where alone it now prevails, or such a Commission must be appointed; and as the Acts and the machinery for giving effect to them have succeeded in putting it down in all the rest, it would be hard to leave the people of Bombay exposed to all the evils arising from the want of such a special Commission. Such Commissions have been adopted to relieve the people from the hardships of the resumption laws, which affected but a small portion of the community; and you hope it would not be considered unreasonable in you to propose one for the relief of the whole community; for the life and property of no family will be safe an hour, if these classes of offenders by hereditary profession are assured that they may carry on their trade with impunity, as they must be if your agency be withdrawn, and all the prisoners be released.
If you make a forcible representation to the Bombay Government in this strong case, they will adopt the measure if they have the power, or ask the power from the supreme Government; and I think the supreme Government will give it. I would say a special Commission for the trial of commitments under XXX. of 1836, and XXIV. of 1843, or a special Commission for the revision of trials under these Acts, as may seem best to Government; but you can say that you think the first would answer the purpose best in the Bombay Presidency. You may offer to run down to Bombay and submit your views to the Government in Council if required. They would not think it necessary, but would be pleased with the offer. Where men are committed on the general charge, it has always been thought necessary to show that the gang committed a murder or a robbery, though it is not so to show what part the prisoners took in them. If your assistant has not done this, he has failed in a material point. He should be very cautious in dealing with whole classes. The fault of our Bombay assistants has always been a disposition to make offenders of whole classes, when only some of the members are so.
You must make your best of the present case–show the necessity of the remedy clearly, and urge it respectfully without pretending to find fault with the Judges; merely say that their interpretation of the laws of evidence laid down for their guidance, however conscientious, forms an insurmountable obstacle to the conviction of offenders by hereditary profession, whose system has been founded upon the experience of their ancestors in the most successful modes of defeating these laws, and the technicalities of ordinary Judicial Courts. This is, I think, all that I can say on the subject at present. The Moncktons leave us this evening, and Amelie intends to set out for the hills on the 6th proximo.
Yours affectionately,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain J. Sleeman.
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Lucknow, 28th September, 1853.
My Dear James,
On further consideration, I think that you should say nothing about the second proposal of a special Commissioner to revise the trials of offenders tried by Sessions Judges. You should suggest the first proposal of a special Commissioner to try all prisoners committed for trial under Acts XXX. of 1836, and XXIV. of 1843, and perhaps also XI. of 1841. See my Printed Report, page 357.
You may mention that such Commissioner should be required to submit his sentences for the consideration and final orders of Government, as all political officers did till March, 1835; or merely for the information of Government, as political officers did after that time.
On the 23rd of March, 1835, the Secretary to the Government of India forwarded to the Resident of Lucknow, for his guidance, the copy of a letter addressed on that date to the Agent of the Governor-General in the Saugor and Nerbudda territories, requesting that he would carry into execution his sentences on Thugs, and not make any reference to Government for confirmation, but merely submit to Government abstract statements of sentences; but desiring that the sanction of the King of Oude should be required before any capital sentence was carried into effect. No capital sentence was from that time passed. As all prisoners will be tried on the general charge, no capital sentence will ever be passed by the special Commissioner, and the Bombay Government may be disposed to give him the same orders. But the Governor in Council at Bombay will be the best judge of that.
Lord Falkland may possibly be deterred by apprehensions that late events may have altered the tone of feeling at home towards him; but I am persuaded that he would be glad to carry this measure into effect. I will send you a copy of the Government letter to the Resident here; and you may get from the agent’s office a copy of that sent on the same date to him, though you may not readily find that office under the new arrangements. You will, I think, have a strong case, and I wish you success in it.
Yours affectionately,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Captain Jas. Sleeman.
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Lucknow, 4th November, 1853.
My Dear Malcolm,
I should recommend for the Baee a money stipend for life of five thousand rupees a-month, with the understanding that if she adopted a child she would have to provide for him out of her savings from this stipend, and out of her private property. All the Rajah’s private property, save what he may will away to others, will of course be left to her, to be disposed of as she may think fit. But this stipend should be independent of those to be continued to the stipendiaries of the Rajah. There are several who have nothing else to depend on but the stipends which they now receive from the Rajah; and it must be borne in mind that they have no longer Bajee Rao, Benaek Rao, the Jhansi and Saugor chief, to go to. This will be the last of the Brahmin dynasties founded in that part of the world by the Peshwas. Our Government should therefore be liberal in taking possession of the estate as an escheat.
The Mahratta language in accounts should at once be done away with; but out of the revenues of the estate, Government should found a good school for English and Hindoo, and Persian; and, above all, for a very good hospital and dispensary, under well educated and tried surgeons, native and European, capable of throwing out branches.
All the public officers of the Rajah should have stipends or employment, or both, in proportion to their period of service and respectability. If they take employment the stipends should be deducted from their salaries while in office, as in our own service.
In the case of the Baee Regent at Saugor, we continued a small part of her pension to her adopted son,–one thousand rupees a-month,–to enable him to provide for her non-pensioned dependents. We took the management long before her death, and left her only a private lady, with a large pension of, I think, eight thousand rupees a-month; besides pensions–too large–to the family of her manager, Benaek Rao: this will be unnecessary at Jhansi. All the large hereditary landholders of the Jhansi estate should have liberal settlements at fixed rates. They are all from the landed aristocracy of Bundelcund, and should be treated with consideration. The first settlement of the land revenue should be very moderate. The lands will lose the most valuable market for their produce in the breaking up of the Court and establishment of the Rajah at the capital, and yield less money, &c., than before. This must be borne in mind.
You may freely use these my views as you think best on the Jhansi question.
As to the management, I should make as little changes possible, till the final orders arrive from the Court of Directors, that you may have nothing to undo of what you have done. I would leave the management to Ellis, under your supervision, and interfere only on references in special cases, except, of course, on emergency. I know not what the system is to be, or what system the Governor-General has recommended, except that there is to be one head, as in Rajpootana; and that all correspondence with Government is to go through that head, In this state of the matter I know not what to suggest or say.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Major Malcolm, &c. &c.
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Lucknow, 11th November, 1853.
My Lord,
I feel grateful for your Lordship’s letter of the 27th ult., but cannot say that I have any hope of discovering the instruments employed, or the employer, in the late affair. The whole power of the Government is in the hands of men who are deeply interested in concealing the truth, and making it appear that no attempt was really made. The minister has, by his intrigues, put himself so much in the power of the knave whom I suspect, that he dares not do anything to offend him. The man could at once ruin him by his exposures if he chose, and he would do so if he found it necessary for his own security. The man is biding his time, as he has often done with former ministers; and the time would have come ere this had not the King, to save himself, married one of the minister’s pretty daughters.
The King’s chief consort; was the niece of the minister, and her son is the heir-apparent; so that it was her interest, and that of her uncle, the minister, to get rid of the King as soon as possible. She is a profligate woman, and the King’s mother is supposed to have given him a hint of his danger. He took a liking to one of the daughters, and married her, in order to make it the minister’s interest to keep him alive as long as possible. He now contrives to make the King believe that neither his life nor reign can be in any danger as long as he is in his present position.
The night after this affair took place, a sipahee of the 35th Native Infantry, standing sentry at one end of the house, fell asleep while he was leaning with his right wrist on the muzzle of his musket. The musket went off; the ball passed through his wrist, grazed a large beam above him, struck against a stone in the roof of the portico, and fell down flattened by the side of the sentry, as he lay insensible and bleeding on the ground below. The wrist was sahttered,[sic] and several of the arteries cut through. He bled profusely, and when taken up he talked incoherently, declaring that some man had fired at him from behind the railing, twenty paces off. I have seen similar cases of incoherency, arising from a similar cause. As soon as day appeared the ball was found, and its marks on the beam and stone above showed the real state of the case. His right knee was probably leaning on the lock of the musket when he fell asleep. I have made no public or official report of this circumstance to Government.
I have now before me a curious instance of the difficulty of getting at the truth when it is the interest of the minister and others about this Court to prevent it. A wanton attack was made in April last by about one hundred armed men, led by one of the King’s collectors, on a native British subject coming from Cawnpore to visit a brother in Oude. The man himself received a wound, from which he some days afterwards died at Cawnpore; two of his attendants were killed, and twenty thousand rupees were taken from him. I have investigated the case myself, with the aid of my assistant, Captain Hayes, and with the attendance of an assessor on the part of the King. The case is a very clear one, but they have produced about thirty witnesses to swear that no man of the poor merchant’s party was hurt; and that, instead of being attacked, he invaded the Oude territory with more than one hundred armed followers, and wantonly attacked the King’s party of only fifteen unoffending men, while engaged in the discharge of their duty in collecting the revenue. I have translated the depositions with the prospect of having ultimately to submit the case to Government, unless the King consents to punish the offenders and afford redress. The assessor, an old man, bewildered by the conflicting testimony, and anxious to escape from all responsibility, slept soundly through the greater part of the inquiry, which has been a very tedious one.
I remain, your Lordship's
Most obedient and humble servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble the Governor-General of India.
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Lucknow, 28th December, 1853.
My Dear Mr. Colvin,
I was glad to see your handwriting again, and to find that time had made so little alteration in it. Oude affairs are, as you suppose, much as they used to be, save that the King is now persuaded by his minister and favourite that, had his predecessors had men and women about them so wise as they are, they never would have acted as if they believed that the Government of India ever really intended to carry into effect the penalty of misgovernment, so often threatened. Our Government has cried “wolf” so often that no one now listens to it. The King is an utter imbecile, from over-indulgences of all kinds; and the knaves whom he employs in his administration contrive to persuade him that the preservation of his life and throne depends entirely upon their vigilance and his doing nothing. Had I come here when the treasury was full, and Naseer-od Doon Hyder was anxious to spend his money in the manner best calculated to do good and please our Government, I might have covered Oude with useful public works, and much do I regret that I came here to throw away some of the best years of my life among such a set of knaves and fools as I have to deal with.
I think you will do much good in your present charge in the subject to which you refer. In the matter of discourtesy to the native gentry, I can only say that Robert Martin Bird insulted them whenever he had the opportunity of doing so; and that Mr. Thomason was too apt to imitate him in this as in other things. Of course their example was followed by too many of their followers and admirers; but, like you, I have been delighted to see a great many of the elder members of the civil service, in spite of these bad examples, treat the native gentry with all possible courtesy, and show them that they had their sympathy as long as they deserved it by their conduct.
It has always struck me that Mr. Thomason, in his system, did all he could to discourage the growth of a middle and upper class upon the land–the only kind of property on which a good upper and middle class could be sustained in the present state of society in India. His village republics and the Ryutwar system of Sir Thomas Munro had precisely the same tendency to subdivide minutely property in land, and reduce all landholders to the common level of impoverishment. The only difference was that the impoverished tenants in the North- Western Provinces were supposed to manage their own affairs, while those at Madras had them managed by a very mischievous class of native public officers. He (Mr. Thomason) would have forced his village republics upon any new country or jungle that came under his charge, and thereby rendered improvement impossible. I would have introduced into all such new countries a system of paternal government in imitation of our Government of India itself, which would have rendered improvement certain, and the growth of a middle and higher class no less so. He would have put the whole under our judicial courts, and thereby have created a middle class of pettifogging attorneys to swallow up all the surplus produce of the land. I would have kept the whole of the land in the hands of our fiscal courts, by making it all leasehold property, and maintaining the law of primogeniture in all estates of villages. Mr. Thomason, I am told, systematically set aside all the landed aristocracy of the country as a set of middlemen, superfluous and mischievous.
The only part of our India in which I have seen a middle and higher class maintained upon the land is the moderately-settled districts of the Saugor and Nerbudda territories; and there is no part of India where our Government and character are so much beloved and respected. You have sent Mr. Read to that part; and if he be bigoted to Mr. Thomason’s system, he will upset all this, and, in my opinion, lay the foundation of much evil. We found a system of paternal government in every village, and maintained and improved it. They were all little principalities; and by the printed rules of the Sudder Board of Revenue, which are very good, all the sub-tenants were effectually secured in their rights.
In making a tour through Oude in the end of 1849 and beginning of 1850 I had a good deal of talk with the people. Many of them had sojourned in our territories in seasons of disturbance. The general impression was that they would be glad to see the country taken under British management, provided we could dispense with our tedious procedure in civil cases. They all had a very unfavourable impression of our civil courts, and of the cost and delay of the procedure. Mills and Harrington, to whom the duty, which was to have devolved on you, has been confided, may do much good, and I hope will, for there really is nothing in our system which calls so much for remedy. I am persuaded that, if it were to be put to the vote among the people of Oude, ninety-nine in a hundred would rather remain as they are, without any feeling of security in life or property, than have our system introduced in its present complicated state; but that ninety- nine in a hundred would rather have our Government than live as they do, if a more simple system, which they could understand, were promised at the same time.
In 1801, when the Oude territory was divided, and half taken by us and half left to Oude, the landed aristocracy of each were about equal. Now hardly a family of this class remains in our half, while in Oude it remains unimpaired. Everybody in Oude believes those families to have been systematically crushed. If by-and-by we can get the people to take an interest in our railroads, and outlays upon other great public works, it will tend to create the middle class upon which I set so much value, and to give that feeling of interest in the stability of our rule which we so much require. We shall then have objects of common interest to talk and think about, and become more united with them in feeling.
Maddock is in Ceylon, but intends to return by the steamer which is to leave Calcutta on the 5th proximo. His speculations there have been failures. Had he looked after his estates there instead of joining the effete party of the Derbyites he might have done well. He has made great mistakes, and he now suffers for them. His support of Lord Torrington was his first.
Believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Mr. Colvin.
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Lucknow, 5th March, 1854.
My Dear Low,
I have to-day written to Government a letter, which you will of course see, on the subject of a proposal made to me by Mr. B. Government will, I have no doubt, consider the reason assigned by me for refusing to permit him to send an European agent to Lucknow, ostensibly to collect debts, sufficient; but whether it will consent to adopt my suggestion, and empower the Resident to assure the King that it will not again consent to permit Mr. B. to return and reside at Lucknow, after he has been twice expelled for his misdeeds, I know not. One thing is certain, that his residence at Cawnpore, under the assurance from the minister that he shall come back and be made wealthy if he can aid in getting rid of the Resident, is very mischievous.
B., Wasee Allee, and the Minister, succeeded in persuading the King that Shurfod Dowla, and all the most respectable members of the Lucknow aristocracy, had signed a memorial to the Government of India, praying that it would set aside the present King as an incompetent fool, and put Mostafa Alee on the throne in his place. All this was reported by me to Government on the 2nd of March, 1853.
The seals were all forged or filched here at Lucknow, but the papers were written in Calcutta, under the agency, I believe, of Synd Jan, Sir H. E.’s moonshee, from Bilgram, where his family have long enjoyed an estate rent-free, for the aid he has given to the minister in his intrigues. I have never been able to remove this delusion from the mind of the imbecile King; and it is the “raw” on which these knaves have been ever since acting; for it enables the minister to persuade him that his vigilance-alone preserves his life and crown.
The minister is aware that I know all this, and may some day be able to show the King how he has been deluded and befooled by him; and he would give all he is worth to get rid of me in any way. He would give any sums to B. and his other agents to bribe editors to write against me; but the only editors who have yielded have been those of the “Mofussilite,” before Mr. C. took the management. Mr. B. complains at Cawnpore, that he gave Mr. L. a large sum to do his dirty work at home; but that he did nothing for it. This is not unlikely. That the minister and Wasee Alee got up the attempt at the Residency, either to make away with me, or to alarm me into going away, I am persuaded; but to get judicial proof of it I shall not attempt. It would be vain here, where the minister has all the revenues of the State to work with.
All the native gentlemen whose seals were forged to this document, look to me for protection; and they have been ever since in a state of great alarm. It was to keep up this alarm that they tried to turn Shurfod Dowla out of Oude. I had rarely seen him before that time; and I have only seen him once since he went to the cantonments; and then only for five minutes during my walk in the garden, to talk about Mulki Jahan’s affairs. They punish any one who ventures to approach the King; and they would ruin any one who ventured to approach the Resident if they could, lest he might open the eyes of the King to the iniquities they commit. The troops are starved, and almost all the old members of the royal family, who had no Government paper or guarantees, have been already starved or driven out. Oude has never before been afflicted by a Sovereign so utterly imbecile and regardless of his duties and the sufferings of his people; nor has there ever been a minister so utterly regardless of his own reputation and that of his master. He bribes with money, power, and patronage, every one who has access to the King, to sound his praise in prose or verse; and the King is persuaded that his life and throne depend upon his abstaining altogether, from interfering in the conduct of affairs.
When I was in the Governor-Generals camp at Futtehgur, M. H., the son of S. A. K., came there armed, I knew, with four lacs of rupees. He was an old acquaintance of E.’s, and he (E.) told me that he had asked for an interview, and asked me whether he ought to consent to see him. I told him that, if he did see him, he must make up his mind to the man’s persuading the King that he had given him the greater part of the money, though the man himself kept all that he did not give to his moonshee. He refused to see the man; but he has ever since been with Mr. L. at Allahabad, intriguing with his people to chouse men out of their ancient possessions; or with the Oude people, to keep up the raw they have established on the King’s mind. The King, by over-indulgence, has reduced his intellect below the standard of that of a boy of five years of age. It is painful to talk to a man with a mind so utterly emasculated.
Our Government would be fully authorized at any time to enforce the penalty prescribed in your treaty of 1837, and it incurs great odium and obloquy for not enforcing it. But Lord D. has, no doubt, solid reasons for not taking such responsibility upon himself at this time. I do all I can to save the people, and the people are sensible of what I do, and grateful for it; for the Resident is the only person they can look up to with any hope. If Government can comply with my wish to have the King assured that it will not permit Mr. B. to return and reside at Lucknow again, it will be of great use to me and to the people, for the hopes held out to him are like a premium offered for my head, or for my ruin; and one never feels very comfortable under such offers, at any time or in any country. The reckless lies which this man gets adventurers at Cawnpore to write for him, and careless or corrupt editors to publish, are apt to stagger those who do not know the vile character of the individual, or the true nature of the facts referred to.
I am glad you saw W. He is a man of high character and first-rate ability, and has abundance of sagacity and energy. I miss him very much. He will be a credit to his regiment if engaged on active service.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To Colonel Low, C.B.
P.S.–I shall say nothing in this of your domestic bereavement, though I have felt much for you.
W. H. S.
In my public letter, I have referred to that of the Marquess of W. to L., when he was Resident. Do refer to it Page 388, Vol. 1., “Despatches.”
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Lucknow, 1st June, 1854.
My Dear Low,
In my letter of the 10th of November, 1853, I solicited permission to retain Weston with me for reasons stated therein. In reply, I was told, in Mr. Dalrymple’s letter of the 2nd of December, “that the Governor-General in Council had every wish to consult my views, but, for the present at least, his Lordship in Council thinks that Lieutenant Weston must in fairness be required to join his regiment, like other officers.”
I am so very anxious to have his services again in the office he filled, that I have to-day ventured, in a public letter to the Foreign Secretary, to request that he will submit my wishes to the Governor-General in Council, should they deem the state of affairs in Burmah at present to be such as to admit of his being withdrawn from his regiment I have said, in my public letter, that should any exigency arise he could, of course, quickly join his regiment on service again.
If you can give me any assistance in obtaining his services, I shall feel very much indebted to you, for I have that confidence in his abilities and high-mindedness which I cannot feel in those of his locum tenens; and I am very anxious to keep things in good train here till the end of the cold weather, when I must go on leave to recruit. I am really in a very difficult position here, not with regard to the King, for he has, I believe, entire confidence in me; but he has become so entangled with his minister, that he is afraid of him; and the minister would give all he has (and he has all the revenues of the country) to get me out of the way.
I carried the Government orders regarding Shurfod Dowla into effect, and he is now, with his family, quiet and safe. The King behaved very well, and resisted all the attempts of the minister to persuade him to remonstrate. I am to-day to submit Shurfod Dowla’s letter of grateful thanks to Government. I hope Government will not write to him in reply, as this might mortify and vex the King, since he is not written to by the Governor-General.
I think I told you of the raw the minister, Wasee Alee and Co., had established on the King’s mind–the belief that a party of the members of the royal family and native gentlemen at Lucknow had been trying to persuade Government to set him aside, and put his reputed brother, Mostafa Alee, on the throne. Whenever they want to make the King angry with any one, they tell him that he is a leader in this cabal. But the King is, by degrees, growing out of this folly. There never was on the throne, I believe, a man more inoffensive at heart than he is; and he is quite sensible of my anxious desire to advise him rightly, and see justice done in all cases. But I am a sad stumbling-block to the minister and the other bad and incompetent officers employed in the administration.
If you wish it, I will be more circumstantial about Weston’s locum tenens, Lieut. B., of the 1st Cavalry. For his own repute, and that of the Government, I think the less he has to do with the political department the better. He would be better in a military staff appointment than a political one.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Hon. Colonel Low, C.B.
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Lucknow, 11th September, 1854.
My Lord,
The post which this morning brought me your Lordship’s letter of the 6th instant brought me also one from Bombay, which I enclose for your Lordship’s perusal. Should you think it worth while, Colonel Outram will be able to sift the matter to which it refers. I have long been aware of the intrigue, and have taken care to let the King know that I am so; but as I knew, at the same time, that the object was merely to get money out of him, and to strengthen his confidence in his minister, which had begun to give way, I did not think it necessary to trouble your Lordship with any reference on the subject. I knew that letters had been forged as from the King of Persia to the King of Oude, proposing to divide Hindoostan between them, and I thought it to be my duty to tell him so, in order to warn him; but, as he denied ever having received such letters, I told him that I should take the word of a King, and say no more about it. He is certainly not of sound mind, and things must, ere long, come to a crisis. His mind may have been of an average kind when he was young, but it has long become emasculated by over-indulgence; and the minister and his minions can make him believe or do what they please. They know that it cannot last long, and they have agents in Bombay and Calcutta to assist them in fleecing the King of money on all manner of false pretences.
The minister, a consummate knave, and one of the most incompetent men of business that I have ever known, has all the revenues and patronage of the country to distribute among those who have access to the King exclusively–they are poets, fiddlers, eunuchs, and profligate women; and every one of them holds, directly or indirectly, some court or other, fiscal, criminal, or civil, through which to fleece the people. Anything so detestable as the Government I have nowhere witnessed, and a man less competent to govern them than the King I have never known.
Had your Lordship left the choice of a successor to me, I should have pointed out Colonel Outram; and I feel very much rejoiced that he has been selected for the office, and I hope he will come as soon as possible. There are many honest men at Lucknow, and a finer peasantry no country can boast. But no honest man can obtain or retain office under Government with the present minister and heads of departments.
But where the whole revenues of a fine country are available to suborn witnesses to prove the King to be a Solomon, no Resident would be able to find judicial proof of his being a fool; but that he is so I have had abundance of, to me, satisfactory evidence ever since I have been here. It must soon, however, become clear, without the Resident’s efforts to make it so. Where the Government of India is so solemnly pledged to see justice done to the people of a country, it cannot fairly permit them to be reigned over much longer by so incompetent a Sovereign. Proofs enough of bad government and neglected duties were given in my Diary; and a picture more true was, I believe, never drawn of any country. The duty of remedying the evils, and carrying out your Lordship’s views in Oude, whatever they may be, must now devolve on another.
No one of my present assistants knows anything whatever about Oude, its Government, or its people; and Colonel Outram will, therefore, labour under great disadvantages. I hope, therefore, that your Lordship will pardon the liberty I take in suggesting that he be allowed the aid of Captain Weston. He went over the whole of Oude with me, and knows almost all who have made themselves prominent for good or for evil within the last five years. I know that, as soon as I go, some of the most atrocious villains whom I have kept out of office will try to purchase their way back; and there is no man too bad for the minister, provided he pays for his restoration.–The murderer of the banker, mentioned in my Diary, vol. i., p. 131, and the murderer of thousands mentioned in the same volume. Captain Weston is high minded, sagacious, energetic, hard-working, conciliatory and, to Colonel Outram, his services in the new charge would be invaluable.
I have the honour to remain, Your Lordship’s faithful and obedient servant, (Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.
To the Most Noble The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T. Governor-General.
THE END.
LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET.