CHAPTER XIV. A SOLITARY EXISTENCE THE COMPANY'S CHAR TER, AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE KINGS OF "Hear him, ye senates! hear this truth sublime : He who allows oppression, shares the crime." DARWIN. "The natives have been treated as an inferior race by government, and have been made to feel this in a greater degree by individuals."-From Shore's "Notes on Indian Affairs," vol. i. p. 77. THE head-quarters of my new "Chief" were about midway between Aurungabad and Nagpore, in the midst of a remote district on the river Taptee, at a place called Dychundah. Here, during the rainy weather, and the unhealthy season which immediately followed; when it was certain death for any human being (except a Bheel or a Ghond) to penetrate the pestilential jungles bordering the Nerbuddah; Captain Bertram usually concentrated his "forces:" consisting of some of the Nizam's Irregular troops, and a body of what he called his "tame Bheels," raised and organized by himself, and without whose assistance, it would have been impossible to track the wild robbertribes to the fastnesses of their mountain and jungle lairs. We reached Dychundah, at a time of the year when Captain Bertram generally took the field, and he immediately exerted all his energy to discover the perpetrators of the cruel murder which, as I have related, had been so recently committed at Jaulnah. The only clue to discovery appeared to consist in a knife, wherewith the deed had been apparently effected, and which had been found beside the body of the murdered man. Large rewards, however, were offered for the apprehension of the assassin; together with a full pardon to such of his accomplices as might thence be induced to give information on the subject; and the "tame" Bheels whom he slipped in pursuit, were rendered doubly keen, by the magnitude of the promised reward. Captain Bertram himself, scoured the country along the foot of the mountains, to the West; whilst I was instructed, after taking a sweep round Baitool, to meet him in the hills, at a place called Cheinpoor. My party, about a hundred in number, consisted of foot and horse. Amongst the latter an old Rissaldar, called Seyud Ishmael, the leader of my small "plump of spears" of Irregular Cavalry, was particularly recommended as worthy of every confidence, and distinguished by courage, activity and intelligence in a most remarkable degree. I was not disappointed in the expectations raised by such high and well-deserved praise; and the honest Seyud,* was always during the whole of this adventurous period of my life, not only a most active and obedient subordinate, but frequently a useful adviser: always a brave and gallant fellow, and a real friend, whom I verily believe would gladly have laid down his life to save mine! Had it not been for the constant state of excitement in which I was kept; the nature of my arduous duties-cut off thus for weeks and months from all European companionship or society—I should, no doubt, have found time *A (supposed) descendant of the Prophet. hang most irksomely on my hands; but employment, for body as well as mind, is, I am convinced, the great secret of contentment and happiness in this world; and to these, with the additional enjoyment of that greatest of blessings: health,—I reckon the time I thus passed in the wild solitudes of Central India, amongst the happiest periods of my life. In my rather anomalous position: half military, half civil, and brought constantly in contact as I was with the natives; I had abundant opportunities of studying their manners, customs and prejudices, and of acquiring many of the native vernacular idioms: opportunities, which, as a Regimental officer, I could not possibly have had during ever so prolonged a residence in this part of the world. Seyud Ishmael, my Rissaldar—a fine old soldier, who had witnessed all the Mahratta campaigns,-being by birth a Pathan, from the North-western provinces of Affghanistan, afforded me the opportunity of keeping up my knowledge of Persian. Ishmael had been born under better auspices, had received (for an Oriental) a liberal education: that is to say he could, on occasion, quote largely from the poets of his native language, and, moreover, in Hin dostannee, spoke the purest "Ourdoo," or language of the Court. Although debarred the society of my fellow-countrymen, I had the advantage of avoiding the expenses usually entailed thereby; so that, with my present handsome allowances, I not only cleared off all former debts; but began to save a little money, in hopes of being enabled at some future period, to return my name for the purchase of a company in my corps. In India, the common necessaries of life are so cheap, that if a person could confine himself to the use of the productions of the country, he might live at a cost so trivial, that in England it would scarcely be believed. Bread, meat, rice, fruit and vegetables, are to be bought at a most trifling outlay; but it is the "Europe" articles: the beer, the brandy, the various expensive wines; soda-water, liqueurs, cheeses, hams; and many other et cæteras, always in such request amongst AngloIndians, which makes living there, so expensive. And it is chiefly owing to the amount of his monthly mess-bills, that many a poor subaltern is plunged irretrievably into debt. Above all things, a young man on first |