336 HAUNTS AND HOBBIES 



1 



never occupied it, never even visited the spot, or if 

 he did it was only in the course of some hunting ex- 

 pedition. Still, however, it is difficult to believe 

 that a tradition so widely spread should have had no 

 foundation. 



But, whether the Emperor ever occupied the palace 

 or not, his stay in it could not have been long, nor 

 was the visit, if it really occurred, again repeated. A 

 century passed away, and the Mogul empire was in 

 the throes of dissolution. Then followed a long period 

 of war and confusion. The population diminished ; the 

 land around fell gradually out of cultivation ; where 

 there had been fields and harvests, the coarse grass, the 

 trees, and brushwood grew up. Ere long the palace 

 became embosomed in forest ; and so, silent and 

 deserted, visited only by the wild animals, for near a 

 hundred years it thus remained. Except in the im- 

 mediate neighbourhood, the very tradition of its exist- 

 ence passed away ; then by a sort of accident it was 

 discovered. 



One of the ancient emperors had constructed a canal 

 to irrigate the upper portion of the Doab, that is, the 

 tract of country that lies between the Ganges and the 

 Jumna. The water of this canal was drawn from 

 the Jumna at a point a few miles below this palace. 

 The canal had long gone to ruin, and when the Doab 

 came into our possession it was little more than a dry 

 trench, partly filled with pools of water during the rains. 

 Some thirty years after we had acquired the country, 

 the Government decided to restore the canal. For the 

 construction of the dam and other buildings at the canal 



