260 



can raise a corps of cavalry and infantry amounting together to 

 one hundred and forty-seven thousand. 



I shall not pursue the subject further; but so noble and dis- 

 tinct a race of people, more or less dispersed throughout the north- 

 ern provinces, deserves our notice. The character they every where 

 preserve of a dignified martial spirit, throws light on the following 

 anecdote, and shows the insufficiency of the English laws among 

 such a people. 



About four years before my appointment to Baroche, some 

 Mahomedans, walking through a village where a family of Kajh- 

 poots resided, approached their house, and accidentally looked into 

 a loom Avhere an elderly woman was eating. They intended no in- 

 sult; they saw her at her meal, and immediately retired: but this 

 accident occasioned a disgrace on the Rajhpoot lady for which, 

 on her part, there could be no expiation. She at that time lived 

 with her grandson, a fine young man, who was absent when the 

 Mahomedans committed their trespass: on his return home she 

 related the circumstance, and her determination not to survive it; 

 she therefore entreated him instantly to put her to death, a step 

 which she had only deferred that she might fall by his hand. The 

 youth's affection and good sense induced him to remonstrate with 

 his venerable parent, whom he endeavoured to dissuade from her 

 purpose by alleging that none but her own family knew of the dis- 

 grace, the very men who were the innocent cause of it being uncon- 

 scious of the offence. Persevering however in her resolution, but 

 unable to persuade either her grandson, or any other person, to 

 perform the sacrifice, she calmly waited until he next went from 

 home, and then beat her head against the wall, with dreadful vio- 



