214 SINGULAR BREACH OF INDIAN LAW. 



of her crime, that, though attached to the man, 

 she preferred flight to the chance of what his 

 fury might inflict on her. However, after allow- 

 ing a reasonable time for the evaporation of his 

 passion, she returned ; and as he had, fortunately 

 for her, shot an animal with the same gun since 

 the disaster, she was let off with a sound thrash- 

 ing, and an admonition to be more careful for 

 the future. This, according to Indian law, was 

 most lenient, as the unhappy female guilty of 

 such delinquency seldom or ever escapes with a 

 slighter punishment than a slit nose, or a bit cut 

 off the ears. In the evening of the day on 

 which this last incident occurred, a man, his 

 wife, and three children, sought our hospitality, 

 in a condition which made me grieve afresh that 

 we had so little to bestow. They were the most 

 wretched party of all — mere shadows. The man 

 was reduced to a skeleton ; and the scanty and 

 tattered covering which served him for a gar- 

 ment, having become hard and frozen, had, by 

 constant friction against his bare legs, produced 

 a dreadful state of excoriation. Nor were the 

 others much better off. Our situation indeed 

 now assumed a serious aspect, and it was im- 

 possible to divest one's self of anxious foreboding 

 for the future. In the midst of this gloom 

 occurred the death of the wretched old woman 

 before mentioned. In spite of all the care 



