16 THE HIGHLANDS OP CENTEAL INDIA. 



within a few years, " unexplored " was written across vast 

 tracts in our best maps ; and, though lying at our very doors, 

 unexplored in reality they were. With few exceptions, the 

 civil officers of those days never dreamt of penetrating the 

 hilly portions of their charges ; and the writer is acquainted 

 with one district containing some 3000 square miles of forest 

 country, and inhabited by between 30,000 and 40,000 abori- 

 gines, in which one officer held charge for eleven years with- 

 out once having put foot within this enormous territory. All 

 accounts of such tracts were filtered through Hindii or Maho- 

 medan subordinates, whose horror of a jungle, and its un- 

 known terrors of bad air and water, wild beasts, and general 

 discomfort, is such as to ensure their painting the country and 

 its people in the blackest of colours. 



But a new era dawned on these dark regions, when the 

 conscience of the British rulers of India was awakened to 

 the wants of their great charge, after a rebellion which nearly 

 ousted them from their seat. Along with many more im- 

 portant provinces, this secluded region felt the benefit of the 

 impulse then given to the administration of the empire. That 

 great civiliser of nations the iron road was to be driven 

 through the heart of its valleys ; and Manchester had pro- 

 phetically fixed an eye on its black soil plains as a future 

 field for cotton. Something stronger than the divided and 

 limited agency of the several local officers who had been 

 sitting still over its affairs was wanted for the guidance of a 

 country and a people who possessed all the elements of a 

 rapid progress. Accordingly, in 1861, were constituted what 

 have since been known as the Central Provinces, under the 

 chief commissionership of Mr. (now Sir Kichard) Temple, of 

 the Bengal Civil Service. 



Then were seen strange sights in that unknown land ; when 



