of room and the disregard of cleanliness. They crowd the cane too
much, and never remove the decayed leaves, and sufficient air is
never admitted.

Bukhtawar Sing has always been considered as the head of the family
to whom Shahgunge belongs, but he has always remained at Court, and
left the local management of the estate and the government of the
districts, placed under their charge in contract or in trust, to his
brothers and nephews. Bukhtawar Sing has no child of his own, but he
has adopted Maun Sing, the youngest son of his brother, Dursun Sing,
and he leaves all local duties and responsibilities to him. He is a
small, slight man, but shrewd, active, and energetic, and as
unscrupulous as a man can be. Indeed old Bukhtawar Sing himself is
the only member of the family that was ever troubled with scruples of
any kind whatever; for he is the only one whose boyhood was not
passed in the society of men in the every-day habit of committing
with impunity all kinds of cruelties, atrocities, and outrages. There
is, perhaps, no school in the world better adapted for training
thoroughbred ruffians (men without any scruple of conscience, sense
of honour, or feeling of humanity) than the camp of a revenue-
contractor in Oude. It has been the same for the last thirty years
that I have known it, and must continue to be the same as long as _we
maintain, in absolute sway over the people, a sovereign who never
bestows a thought upon them, has no feeling in common with them, and
can never be persuaded that his high office imposes upon him the
obligation to labour to promote their good, or even to protect them
against the outrage and oppression of his own soldiers and civil
officers_. All Rajah Bukhtawar Sing's brothers and nephews were bred
up in such camps, and are thorough-bred ruffians.