106 ANECDOTE OF A RAJAH. 



'' The Wunpurty country was productive and 

 well governed by its chief, who had not only 

 erected bungalows for travellers at every stage, 

 but also established free dispensaries in several of 

 the large towns under well trained native doctors, 

 with every kind of medicine at command. In 

 short, the Rajah is a very superior man, and it is 

 only to be regretted that his expenditure in early 

 life, though he is still a young man, was beyond 

 what he could afford ; for it placed him in the 

 hands of the Arab money-lenders at Hydera- 

 bad, whose cent, per cent, exactions soon bring 

 ruin on those who have the misfortune to fall 

 into their hands, as was the case with my 

 friend the Rajah, who being indebted in a 

 large sum to a powerful Arab Jemadar at Hy- 

 derabad, that worthy endeavom-ed to get him 

 into his clutches. This, however, could not 

 have been but for the treachery of Rajah Ram 

 Buksh, the then Peshkar to the Nizam, who, 

 for a consideration, invited the Rajah to Hy- 

 derabad, and when there gave him up to his 

 creditor, who refused to release him without 

 liquidation of the debt, with most usurious in- 

 terest, or a part of the same, and a fresh bond 

 for the balance. As the Rajah was not, how- 



