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subject of what should be done with me.

The men

complained that they had been two months in the jungle on my account, their families were in the villages very badly off for food, and that they would stay no longer. Their chief replied, "Let us kill him, and flee to some other part of the country." To this they objected that the English would send troops and take their families prisoners and ill-use them. So in the end it was agreed to keep me for the present.

'My release was effected at last through our Political Agent, Captain Ballantine, who prevailed on the Nawab of Joonaghur to use his influence to get another Kattee who had forcibly taken Bawawalla's Pergunna, or district, to restore it to him, and Bawawalla thus having gained his object, set me free.

'My sufferings during confinement were almost beyond endurance, and I used to pray in the evening that I might never see another morning. I had my boots on my feet for the first month, not being able to get them off from the constant wet until I was reduced by sickness. Severe fever,

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with ague and inflammation of liver, came on, and with exposure to the open air drove me delirious, so that when let go I was found wandering in the fields at night covered with vermin from head to foot. I shall never forget the heavenly sensation of the hot bath and clean clothes I got in the tent of the Nawab of Joonaghur's Dewan, the officer who accomplished my release. The fever and ague then contracted continued on me for five years, and the ill effects still remain, my head being at times greatly troubled with giddiness, and I have severe fits of ague; my memory also is much affected, but I can never forget the foregoing incidents, though it is now upwards of fifty years since they occurred.

'BARHOLM HOUSE, CREETOWN, N.B. :

'April, 1871.'

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'G. GRANT.

Extract from the Bombay Courier,' April 24, 1824.

'By intelligence from Kattywar, we learn that the notorious Bawawalla has at last met with the fate he has so long merited. He was attacked on

the 6th inst. in Bessawudder by Hursoor, a Katty chief with whom he had long been at enmity, and was slain by him in a desperate conflict.

'It may be in the recollection of many of our readers that this person in 1820 carried off Lieutenant Grant of the H. C. Marine, while in the Gaekwar's service, and kept him in captivity for three months, during which time he was treated with the most savage cruelty. For some years past Bawawalla has been little heard of, but having lately resumed his former predatory course, apprehensions were entertained that he would be the cause of disturbances in that part of the country, when his career has been thus unexpectedly closed by death.'1

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1 In this and the previous Chapter allusion has been made to the opium-consuming habits of the people. The amount they can take without seemingly shortening life appears almost incredible. bhar-wuttia leader, by name Champrajwala, another Bawawala, though less ferocious, had, in conflict with some of our troops, shot an officer of the 15th Native Infantry. He was at last secured and made over to the Political Agent for trial. Whilst in gaol, the Civil-Surgeon informed me so ill had the prisoner become from deprivation of opium that to keep him alive he was obliged daily to increase his dose to the astounding quantity of seventy grains, that on reducing this more than a few grains he again fell ill, and that he could never reach a moderate minimum without being again obliged

to increase the allowance. Champrajwala was convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for life, and transferred some four-and-thirty years ago to the Ahmedabad gaol, whence, many years after, he made a bold attempt to escape. He was ultimately liberated, and, for aught I know, may be still alive-his habitual dose of opium was the size of a large pigeon's egg.

117

CHAPTER IX.

HINDOO SUPERSTITIONS CONTINUED-OUR LAWS

NOT ADAPTED TO THE CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE.

`ARLY in 1844 I was placed in charge of the

EAR

Sawunt Waree territory during an insurrection that had broken out there in concert with another simultaneously raging above the Ghats in the Southern Mahratta country. I found the State unable to meet current expenses, and the reform of its finances had in consequence to be effected. Among numerous items of expenditure struck off or reduced was a monthly payment to a demon called King of the Hobgoblins. His Majesty's palace was the forest, and he was propitiated every night by a meal placed outside the gateway of the fort which held the Raja's palace, and also, amongst other buildings, the dwelling of the Political Superintendent.

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