﻿74 NARRATIVE OF A ROUTE ' 



The meafurements, and a (ketch, which I took of 

 this place, employed me till near the clofe of the day; 

 when we direcled oar way back to camp, where I 

 arrived about feven o'clock in the evening, much 

 fatigued with the occupations of the day. But I had 

 barely rcRed myfelf a little, and fat down to my 

 dinner, when a man, who had gone a little way into 

 the jungle, came running tome, and reported, that 

 he had difcovered a body of armed men in a ravine 

 within fifty yards of our camp. That upon his in- 

 quiring of them the caufe of their being there, he had 

 been ordered in a very premptory manner to depart, 

 and had thought it expedient to report thecircumftance 

 tome with as little delay as poffible. Having finifhed 

 my meal, I ordered the tents to be removed, from 

 the fkirts of the jungle, to an open fituation; and 

 fending then for Shalikram, I demanded of him the 

 caufe of the armed men being affembled, and who 

 they were. He told me they were the advanced guard 

 of Biilbudder Shaw's army, which had left Shawpour^ , 

 the day after us, upon an expedition to plunder fome 

 villages contiguous to the Rajah's eaftern frontier, 

 I obferved to him, that their being pofted fo near us 

 had a very myfterious appearance; and told him, that 

 in obferved them approach any nearer during the 

 night, I fnould not hefitate to attack them. He de- 

 fired me to reft perfectly fatisfied that they would re- 

 main quiet in their prefent fituation, and departed ap- 

 parently with the intention of giving them a caution 

 on that head. 



After the duplicity the i^^zy'd^A had fiiewn in endea- 

 "vouring to impede my progrefs, I conceived that any 

 thing Shalikram might fay, or do, could not be relied 

 on; and by the intelligence I gained from an i/iV/^^r- 

 rah^ whom I had fcnt difguifed to watch the motions 

 of the armed party in the ravine, I had every reafon to 

 believe that it was their intention to attack me on the 

 iiril favourable opportunity. We lay down, therefore, 



under 



