?^6 ' SKETCH OF THE^ SIKHS; 



by the prince ; but it is very improbable they had ever force to encounter 

 the concentrated army of the Ahddlis^ before which, while it remained in 

 a body, they appear, from the first to the last of their contests with that 

 prince, to have always retreated^, or rather fled. 



The internal state of AJghdnistan, since the death of Ahmed Shah, has 

 prevented the progress of the 5zM nation receiving any serious check 

 from that quarter ; and the distradted and powerless condition of the em- 

 pire of India has offered province after province, to their usurpatioOa 

 Their history, during this latter period, affords little but a relation of vil» 

 lage warfare, and predatory incursions. Their hostilities were first di- 

 reeled against the numerous Miihammedan chiefs who were settled in the 

 Penjdh, and who defended, as long as they could, their Jdgirs, or estates, 

 against them ; but these have either been conquered, or reduced to such 

 .narrow limits, as to owe their security to their insignificance^ or the pre- 

 carious friendship of some powerful Sikh chief, whose support they have 

 gained ; and who, by prote6ling them against the other leaders of his 

 tribe, obtains a slight accession of strength and influence. . 



The Sikh nation, who have, throughout their early history, always ap- 

 .peared, like a suppressed flame, to rise into higher splendour from every 

 attempt to crush them, had become, while they were oppressed, as formi- 

 dable for their union, as for their determined courage and unconquerable 

 spirit of resistance ; but a state of persecution and distress, was the one 

 most favourable for the a.6kion of a constitution like theirs; which, formed 

 upon general and abstract principles, required constant and great sacri- 

 ■ iices, of personal advantage, to the public good; and such can alone be 

 expefted from men, a^ing under the influence of that enthusiam, which 

 the fervor of a new religiori or struggle for independence only impart, and 



