224 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



previous to the Muhammadan conquest. After re- 

 sisting several very formidable Muhammadan attacks, 

 conducted by such great conquerors as Sultan Mu- 

 hammad Taglak of Delhi, and Ahmed Shah, the 

 founder of Ahmedabad, it succumbed, A.D. 1477, to 

 Sultan Muhammad Begra of Giizerat. It afterwards 

 became a dependency of the Mogul empire, and 

 hence arose the present title of its prince Xawab, 

 originally meaning a deputy. Here the history be- 

 comes intricate, and the details would be uninter- 

 esting. Suffice to say, that about 1735 Shere Khan 

 Babi, a soldier of fortune, displaced the deputy and 

 founded the present dynasty. Its ruler, when I 

 visited it, Nawab, or Nabob Sahib Mohobutklianji, 

 was between thirty and forty years old. His juris- 

 diction, under the paramount power of Britain, was 

 a first-class one that is to say, he had the power of 

 life and death over all but British subjects ; and in 

 many other respects he had the entire control of 

 his state, subject only to the advice of the British 

 political agents and of the Bombay Government. 

 His state comprised 890 towns and villages, 62,300 

 houses, a population of 249,200, and afforded him 

 an acknowledged land revenue of Es. 1,300,000, or 

 about 130,000. But most of the states of Kathia- 

 Avar paid him annual sums ranging from Es. 20 to 

 Es. 5000 ; and if I am not mistaken, these payments, 

 which form a very considerable aggregate, are not 

 included in the above revenue. They go under the 



