Chapter 4

THE BALL.

The ancient burg, or castle, of Gradiska had been originally on a larger scale, but, at this period, consisted only of a centre, flanked at right angles by two wings ending in square towers, large, grey, and massive, and embattled, with overhanging galleries for sentinels to pace along, while similar galleries, on a smaller scale, extended along the entire front and wings of the castle. The central edifice contained, on the ground-floor, numerous apartments and offices for menials; above which arose a spacious saloon and other lofty apartments, lighted by windows high above the flooring, and terminating in the round-headed arches so commonly seen in the castellated mansions of northern Italy. In this palatial hall preparation had been busy for the ball, to which the wife of the archducal counsellor so impatiently looked forward, as an opportunity to eclipse all rivals by the splendour of her jewels. The hour of reception by the archduke had arrived. The exterior of the spacious edifice was illuminated from end to end by nunerous torches, and the capacious staircase was lighted by a double rank of torch-bearers, in splendid apparel. In the interior of the vast apartment huge waxen tapers were fixed above the _chevron_, or zig-zag moulding, which ran round the walls, and connected the casement of each window. Large crystal lamps, pendant from the point of each inverted pinnacle on the lofty roof, diffused a flood of brilliant light, and imparted life and colour to the rich tapestries, portraying stirring scenes from the Crusades, which covered the walls from floor to window. Complete suits of armour, exhibiting every known device of harness, and numerous weapons, fancifully arranged, decorated the spaces between the windows. And now began to appear, in this scene of splendour, groups of knights and nobles, arrayed in velvet and cloth of gold, and attending upon fair dames, sparkling with jewels, and bearing nodding plumes upon their braided hair. Conspicuous amidst these, and towering above all in stature, appeared the haughty mistress of Strasolda, attired in a robe of dark green velvet, which well relieved the fairness of her complexion, and displaying upon her finely moulded neck and arms a collar and bracelets of large and lustrous oriental pearls. Her firlgers were bedecked with costly rings, and upon her head she wore an ornament of singular device, which soon attracted universal attention. Above the rim of a golden comb, richly chased and studded with brilliants, arose a peacock with expanded tail. The body was of chased gold in imitation of feathers, the arching neck was mosaic work of precious stones, the eyes were sparkling diamonds of the purest water, and the feathers of the tail glittered with emeralds, rubies, and sapphires of singular beauty and lustre. So great was the curiosity excited by the dazzling splendour of these jewels, that the fair wearer was followed round the room by a train of ladies, anxious to observe at leisure a display of ornaments so extraordinary, and whispering to sympathizing ears conjectures not over charitable to the counsellor's wife. When, at length, she had seated herself upon one of the sofas which lined the walls, a circle of admiring gazers was formed, whose numbers were rapidly increased by the attendant cavaliers. While the lady was enjoying her triumph, a bustle at the entrance of the hall turned every head in that direction, when the cause appeared in the person of the young archduke, who entered in full costume, followed by a group of courtiers, and accompanied by a Venetian cavalier, of tall and commanding person, with whom he appeared to be in earnest discourse. The stranger was a large-boned, spare, and powerful man, of middle age, and attired in a black vest and pantaloons of woven silk, with a short cloak, of the same hue. The golden hilt of his rapier, and a gold chain and medallion round his neck, were his only ornaments. His features were large, regular, and grand, and the gaze of his full dark eyes serene, yet firm and potent; his complexion pale, and contrasting strongly with a dark beard which circled his visage like a frame. His high and massive forehead, and well closed lips, had a character of thought and decision, while his mien and tread were those of one long accustomed to authority. He seemed a man born after his time, and worthy to have lived and acted in the high and palmy days of Venice. After attending the archduke to the steps of the dais at the upper end of the hall, he made his bow, and began to pace the floor in seeming abstraction from the gay scene around him. Arrested in his progress by the numerous groups which, after saluting the archduke, had again collected around the counsellor's lady, he paused in returning conciousness; and, looking for the cause of such unwonted attraction, was enabled, by his lofty stature, to obtain a glimpse of the jewelled lady within the circle. Her features were unknown to him; but when his careless gaze fell upon the rare ornament which crowned her redundant tresses, his countenance became suddenly darkened by some strong emotion. Again, he looked more earnestly, and with increasing wonder and curiosity. Controlling, by a sudden effort, all outward evidence of feeling, he watched his opportunity, and at length penetrating within the crowd, stood for some moments before the object of attraction, and gazed, as if admiringly, upon her various adornments in succession; then, bowing gracefully, he addressed to her some words of compliment upon the splendour and value of the dazzling bird upon her head. "Fair lady," he continued, "I have a daughter whom I fondly love, and fain would I bestow upon her youthful beauty such ornaments as yours. But say, I pray you, where can the cunning hand be found which fashions such glorious birds? Was it in Venice or Vienna that you bought this materpiece of art?" Unsuspicious of evil, and bridling at gratified vanity at this attention from a stranger of such distinguished mien, the spoil-bedecked fair one replied to him as she had done to others.

"I bought this ornament, some weeks back, in Venice, at the store of a Greek trader from the Levant."

"Ha!" exclaimed the stranger; "and where dwelt this Greek, that I may see and ask him for another such?"

The concious lady, embarrassed by such close questioning, and somewhat alarmed by the kindling glances of the questioner, replied in haste--"Nay, signor, now I remember better, it was not a Greek I bought these gauds, but of a trading Jew, who walks the Merceria with a box of jewellry."

"Just now, methinks, you said a Greek, fair lady; and now you say a Jew. What next? Why not a Moslem, or perchance _an Uzcoque?_"

At this ominous conclusion, which the stranger muttered in tones of marked significance, the alarmed culprit started to her feet; and her fierce temper getting the better of her prudence, she boldly faced the cavalier, exclaiming, in a louder key than beseemed a courtier's wife--

"And who are you, signor, that dare thus question the lady of an archducal counsellor?"

"Lady!" he sternly answered, "here I am known to none save your husband's master; but in Venice men call me the Proveditore Marcello."

And now flashed upon the indignant signora a fearful reminiscence of Jurissa's unheeded and forgotten warning, to hide her jewels for a time, and to beware of the Proveditore Marcello. In utter dismay, and nearly fainting with alarm, she sank upon the sofa, and her eyes expanded into the wide stare of terror as she gazed at the menacing visage of the Venetian noble. Unwilling to expose the conscience-striken woman before so numerous an assemblage, he seated himself beside her, and in tones inaudible to others thus whispered in her ear--"Lady! but eight days back the jewels that you wear were mine. That peacock was my own design, and made for my daughter by a cunning artificer in Candia. Its like exists not in the world; for the mould was made by my order, and broken as soon as used. 'Twas mine until the base Uzcoques plundered my baggage. How thus quickly it passed from them to you, is as well known to me as to yourself. But mark me, lady! if all these jewels are not delivered at my apartments in the west wing of the castle ere midnight, I will denounce your husband and his colleagues as long-suspected and now-proved partakers with the Pirates of Segna. And, should redress be denied me here, the ambassador of Venice shall report this infamous collusion before a higher tribunal in Vienna."

Struck dumb by this terrible denunciation, the fair culprit gasped for breath, and her evident distress having been watched in growing wonder by the assembled ladies and cavaliers, the latter began to mutter threats of vengeance. One of them now stepped forward, and, grasping the hilt of his rapier, accused the Venetian of having insulted the wife of a nobleman high in the councils of the archduke, when the Proveditore, looking down upon the courtier with that riveted and intensely piercing gaze which staggers the beholder like a sudden blow, and may still be noted in many of Titian's portraits, answered with brief and startling emphasis--

"Signor! you do me grievous wrong. 'Tis I, and not the lady, who am the injured party."

Awed by his gathering brow, and the settled, stern, unsparing resolution which flashed from every feature, and indicated a man confident in his own resources, the courtiers did involuntary homage to his loftier spirit, and gave way. The proud Venetian strode through the yielding circle and quitted the hall, while the counsellor's wife, pleading illness and fatigue in reply to the pointed and numerous questions of surrounding friends and enemies, summoned her husband to attend her, and retired to her apartments.

Meanwhile the young Moslem and his companion in misfortune, who had been brought prisoners to Gradiska, were confined in one of the massive towers which flanked the castle. They had arrived not long before the comencement of the festival, and when going under guard along a corridor in the east wing, Ibrahim passed the open door of an apartment in which Strasolda was adjusting the rich jewels of the counsellor's lady before her appearance in the ball-room. Startled by the approaching tramp of armed men, the Uzcoque maiden raised her eyes, and beheld the noble and well-remembered features of the young Turk, whose captive she had been, and whose image had so strangely reappeared to her through the flitting cloud of smoke in the cavern. "Mother of Heaven!" she exclaimed, covering her eyes with her hands; "do I again behold that Moslem youth, ever appearing when least expected?" Again she gazed; but the prisoners, hurried onward by their guards, had proceeded to the end of the corridor, where a narrow winding staircase, fashioned in the immense thickness of the tower wall, led to their appointed prison, a large square apartment, the sides of which were panneled to a considerable height, and imperfectly lighted by small windows, or rather embrasures, perforating a wall many feet in thickness. Here they were left to their reflections, and to what comfort they could derive fron a lamp and a supply of provisions. Hassan, wearied with his journey, hastily swallowed his supper, and, stretching himself upon a paillasse, soon forgot his calamities in sound repose. Ibrahim, more vigilant and less apprehensive of future evil, as the Turks and Austrians were then at peace, paced awhile along the floor of his spacious prison, musing on the peerless charms of the Uzcoque maiden. From time to time he gazed upon the walls and windows as if calculating the chances of escape, when gradually the peculiar and regular design of the panneling caught and fixed his attention. It was divided by prominent mouldings into oblong squares, from the centres of which projected large diamond-shaped bosses of carved oak. This peculiarity at length roused into action some reminiscences of the early life and adventures of his beloved patron, the pacha of Bosnia, to the recital of which he had often, in his boyhood, listened with eager delight. These recollections, at first shadowy and indistinct, became gradually more vivid and accurate, until finally the full conviction flashed upon him that his benefactor, when taken prisoner in his youth by the Austrians, had been confined in this very tower and room, and, by a singular discovery, had been enabled to liberate himself and his fellow-prisoners. The pacha, then a subordinate in rank, in endeavouring to reach the level of one of the embrasures, had mounted upon the shoulders of a comrade, and was supporting himself by a firm grasp of the large boss in the centre of the pannel, when suddenly he felt it turning round in his hand. Surprised to find it not a fixture, he pulled it towards him, and found that it slowly yielded to the impulse. Drawing it out of the socket, he saw it followed by an iron chain, which for a time resisted all his efforts, but at length gave way, and he heard a grating sound like the drawing of a rusty bolt. Suddenly the entire pannel shook, and then the lower end started back sufficiently to betray a recess in the wall. Hastily descending on his comrade's shoulders, and pushing back the pannel, he discovered that it was supported by hinges, and was doubtless intended to conceal a secret issue from the castle, which he soon ascertained, and effected his escape. These facts were all that the memory of Ibrahim could supply; but they were enough to guide him in his search, and he immediately proceeded to sound the pannels in succession with his fist. Commencing with the southern or outer wall, which he supposed more massive and more likely to contain a secret passage, he sounded each pannel, and perceiving in the corner one more reverberation than in the others, he roused Hassan from his slumbers. "Hassan! Hassan!" he exclaimed, "Arouse thee, man! and listen to good tidings." The awakened sleeper gazed with half-opened eyes upon his excited companion, and would have dropped to sleep again had not a few words of explanation and the hope of escape fully roused him. Having with some difficulty perched his rotund person upon the ample shoulders of Ibrahim, he followed his directions and grasped the wooden boss, which, to the inexpressible delight of both, yielded, as it had done forty years before to the captive Turk, and displayed the iron chain. Bidding Hassan replace the boss, Ibrahim determined to postpone his attempt until the festival had collected all the guards and menials into the central edifice and its approaches. An hour before midnight, when the young Moslem expected the revelry would be at its height, Hassan again mounted upon his shoulders, and after many strenuous efforts, at length succeeded in drawing up the bolt. The pannel receded some inches, and Ibrahim raising it still further, seized the lamp and entered a small oblong recess in the wall, which was not less than ten or twelve feet in thickness. Perceiving no outlet, he examined the wooden flooring, and soon discovered a trap, which, when raised by the ring attached, exposed to view a steep and narrow descending staircase, leading apparently to some sally-port beyond the castle ditch. After carefully trimming his lamp, he was about to lead the way into this dark abyss, when a sound, sharp and sudden, as of something falling in the adjacent prison, caught his ear. Retracing his steps, he re-entered the apartment, where, after a brief search, he found beneath one of the embrasures a paper folded round a large pebble. Hastily opening it, the following lines, written in the _lingua Franca_ so common in the Levant, were visible.

"Moslem! If thy soul belie not thy noble form and features, thou wilt not withhold thine aid from a bereaved and sorrowing daughter. Before to-morrow's sunset thou wilt be free, for Austria wars not with the Turk. Then straight repair to Venice, and there await the Battle of the Bridge. Take thy stand beneath the portal of St Barbara, and follow the man who whispers in thine ear,

"STRASOLDA."

"Mashallah!" shouted the enraptured youth, "these lines are from the Uzcoque maiden; and by the gates of Paradise I'll do her bidding, though it perils life."

For a time he was tempted to follow her guidance implicitly, and await the promised release from the authorities of Gradiska; recollecting, however, the proverbial slowness of Austrian counsellors, and too restless and ardent to endure suspense, he resumed his purpose of exploring the secret passage. After he had secured the pannel and replaced the boss, he bade Hassan follow him and began to descend. The staircase ended in a small passage round an angle, beyond which he discovered a similar descent, followed by another angle and staircase, proving that this secret issue from the castle penetrated through each of the four massive walls which formed the tower. At length their further progress was stopped by a door, originally strong and plated with iron, but now so much decayed, that although fastened by bolts without, the joint strength of the two captives forced it from its hinges. They now entered a vaulted passage of hewn stone, low and narrow, and with no visible termination. As they advanced, the long pent-up and dank unwholesome vapours made it difficult to breathe, and compelled Ibrahim to pause repeatedly and trim his lamp, which burned so dimly in this oppressive atmosphere as to be nearly extinguished. After a while the path began to slope upwards, and erelong they distinguished moonlight faintly streaming through a tangled mass of ivy which concealed the remains of an iron grating, broken probably in his patron's successful attempt to escape by this secret passage from the prison above. Gazing through the aperture, they perceived not many feet below what had once been the castle ditch, now dry, and forming a portion of the archduke's gardens. With a joyous heart and an elastic bound, Ibrahim reached the soft turf beneath. The more timid and helpless Hassan lowered himself by clinging to a remaining iron bar, and with the aid of his companion was soon on his feet, enjoying, with many thanks to Allah, the fresh air of heaven and the consciousness of escape from captivity. The gates of the palace gardens being unguarded during the festival, the liberated prisoners reached the coast without an obstacle, compelled a fisherman to take them in his bark across the Adriatic, and land them on the Lido, which forms the outward limit of the port of Venice. Then making free with an unwatched gondola, they sped across the bay, and were soon in safety, beneath the roof of a Turkish trader and correspondent of Hassan.

Before their escape was discovered on the following morning, the indignant Proveditore had departed for Venice, and Strasolda had disappeared.

* * * * *

COLONEL DAVIDSON'S TRAVELS IN INDIA.[5]

[5] _Diary of Travels and Adventures in Upper India_, from Bareilly, in Rohilcund, to Hurdwar and Nahun, in the Himalaya Mountains; with a Tour in Bundelcund, a Sporting Excursion in the Kingdom of Oude, and a Voyage down the Ganges. By C.J.C. DAVIDSON, Esq., late Lieut.-Col. of Engineers, Bengal.

The appearance of this work was heralded some three months since, as divers of our readers may possibly remember, by a species of puff-preliminary, for which even the annals of Great Marlborough Street afforded no precedent--being nothing less than the appearance of Mr Colburn, _in propriâ personâ_, at the bar of the police-office adjoining his premises, to answer the complaint of the gallant and irate author for what he was pleased to consider the unwarrantable detention of the MS. from which his narrative had been printed. It was alleged, in extenuation, that "the gallant colonel's MS. was so nearly undecipherable, that Mr Colburn had been put to considerable expense in revising the press;"--and a mysterious and curiosity-provoking hint was further thrown out, that "it was the custom of the trade, that, until a work was published, the MS. should not be parted with by the publisher, as it might turn out that some part of it was libellous, and in such case the publisher must produce the MS." In the end the gallant colonel (whom the newspaper reports described as "very much excited,") took nothing by his motion in regard to the recovery of the MS.; but though in this respect he may have been somewhat scurvily treated, we cannot equally sympathize with his complaints of the work not having been duly _advertised_; for surely all the little "neatly turned paragraphs" that ever proceeded from Mr Colburn's laboratory, could not have been so effectual as the method struck out by the impromptu genius of the colonel himself, in intimating to the public that something quite out of the common way might be expected from the forthcoming production thus brought before its notice.

And verily those who have been prepared for a queer volume, will not be disappointed in the diary of our choleric and corpulent colonel. If ever the assurance, which seems to be regarded as indispensable in the preface to works of this class, that the author "wrote the following pages purely for his own amusement," bore the stamp of unequivocal truth, it is in the present instance; and, notwithstanding the asseverations of Mr Colburn and his literary employés, it is difficult to conceive that any revision whatever can have been bestowed on the rough notes of the writer, since they were first hastily committed to paper amidst the scenes which they describe. The style is as rambling and unconnected as the incidents to which it refers; but wherever the author's devious footsteps lead us, from the jungles of Bundelcund to the holy ghâts of Hurdwar, the principal figure is always that of the colonel himself, who, in the portly magnificence of twenty stone minus two pounds, fills up the whole foreground with himself and his accessories of servants, elephant, stud, Nagoree cows, and other component parts of the _suwarree_ or suite of a _Qui-hye_, who can afford to make himself comfortable after the fashion of the country. The quantity (sometimes not trifling) and quality of his meals, the consequent state of his digestion, and his endless rows on the score of accommodations and forage with thannadars, darogahs, kutwals, and all the other designations for Hindoo and Hindoostani jacks-in-office, (for to Feringhi society he appears to have been not very partial,) may doubtless have been points of peculiar interest to the colonel himself, but are not likely to engage the attention of the world in general, and had better have been omitted in the revision of the diary, instead of being chronicled, as they are on all occasions, with wearisome minuteness of detail. But with all these drawbacks, a man who, as he says of himself, "has dwelt in India twenty-five years, and traversed it from the snowy range to Bombay on the west, must have seen something of the country, and may be supposed to know something of the natives"--among whom, by the way, he seems to have mingled more familiarly than most Feringhis; and in spite of all the egotism and rigmarole with which his pages abound, the rambles of this "stout gentleman" through Upper India, and some other parts of the country not much visited by Europeans, present us with a good deal of plain sense and sterling matter, viewed, it is true, with the eccentric eye of a humorist, and frequently couched in very odd phraseology; but not the less true on that account. His opinions on all men and all things are expressed with the same honesty and candour with which he narrates the various scrapes in which he was involved, while pushing right a-head like an elephant through a jungle;--and though laughing at him quite as often as with him, we have found the colonel, on the whole, far from an unpleasant travelling companion.

Bareilly, on the fronters of Oude and Rohilcund, was the colonel's starting-point;--and thence on St Patrick's day[6] he set forward for Hurdwar, at the head of a retinue, the members of which, both quadruped and biped, he enumerates seriatim, giving the _pas_ to the former--a precedence perhaps well merited by steeds up to such a welter weight under the climate of India, over such a set of unredeemed and thriftless knaves as he describes his native attendants. Accordingly, he gives the names and pedigrees of the whole stud, from "the buggy mare Maiden-head and my wicked little favourite Fish-Guts," up to "my favourite brood-mare Fair Amelia, purchased at a prize sale on the frontier, and bred by the king of Bokhara, with his royal stamp on her near flank--stands nearly fifteen and a half hands high, with magnificent action and great show of blood--had, when taken, four gold rings in her nostrils, now removed and replaced by silver, which will be stolen by her groom one by one." His first day's march was to Futtehgunge, ("the mart of victory," being the scene of the memorable battle in 1774, in which the English, as the bought allies of the Nawab Shoojah-ed-dowlah, defeated and slew the gallant Rohilla chief, Hafez-Rehmut;) and here he oracularly announced a discovery in gastronomy, of which it would be unpardonable not to give our readers the benefit. "I used my farourite condiment, tomata sauce, with my beef; and _to all who are ignorant_ of this delicious vegetable I may venture to recommend its sauce, as at once both wholesome and savoury, if eaten with anything but cranberry tart or apple pie!" It is melancholy to reflect how often the best efforts of genius are anticipated and rendered of no avail. The colonel, when he penned this sentence with a heart overflowing with Epicurean philanthropy, was evidently unconscious that "chops and tomata sauce" were already familiar to the British public from the immortal researches of Mr Pickwick!

[6] The year is not specified; but as the Ramazan is subsequently said to have ended March 25, it must have been in the year of the Hejra 1245, ansering to A.D. 1830.

Rampore, in the territory of which the colonel now found himself, is still a semi-independent state, the Nawab of which has a revenue of sixteen lacs of rupees, (£160,000,) while the city, being without the pale of English law, is "a city of refuge, a very Goshen of robbers, ... the streets are crowded with a mob of very handsome, idle, lounging fellows, having generally the fullest and finest jet-black beards and black mustaches in the world. Many of these were handsomely dressed, and many (which struck me as a very curious fact) appeared clean!" These were the Pathans and Rohillas, partly descended from the original Moslem conquerors of India, and partly from those who have more recently migrated from Affghanistan and the adjoining countries. The most athletic and warlike race among the Indian Mahommedans, and too proud of their blood to exercise any profession but that of arms, they are found in every town throughout Upper India, swaggering about with sword, shield, and matchlock, in the retinues of the native princes, and ready to join any enterprise, or flock to the standard of any invader, through whose means any prospect is afforded of shaking off the Feringhi yoke, and resuming their ancient predominance in the country which their forefathers won by their swords from the idolaters. "They hate us with the most intense bitterness, and can any one be surprised at it? We have taken their broad lands foot by foot." Few if any of these turbulent spirits are found in our European regular native army; their dislike to the cumbrous accoutrements and awkward European saddles operating equally, perhaps, with the severity of the drill and discipline to deter them; but they form the strength of the various corps of irregular horse--a force which, of late years, has most judiciously been greatly increased in numbers, and the uniform dashing bravery of which in the field, strongly contrasts with the misconduct of one at least of the regular native cavalry regiments in the late Affghan war. "I have seen," (says the colonel,) "a lineal descendant of Pathan Nawab's serving in the ranks of Hearsay's horse, as a common trooper on twenty rupees a-month, out of which he had merely to buy and feed his horse, procure clothes, arms, and harness, and sustain his hereditary dignity! By his commander and his fellow-soldiers he was always addressed by his title of Nawab Sahib!"

The small-pox was committing dreadful ravages in Rampore and its neighbourhood; and though vaccination was performed gratis at Bareilly, the fatalist prejudices of the natives, even of those of rank and education, prevented them from availing themselves of the boon. All the instances of the colonel, in behalf of a charming little girl, four years old, whose mother and sister had already taken the infection, could get from her father nothing more than a promise "to think of it! If it's her fate----" said he. "'You fool!' said I, in my civil way," (and the colonel's _brusquerie_ was here, at least, not misplaced,) "'if a man throws himself into the fire or a well, or in the path of a tiger, is he without blame?'" Such apathy seems almost unaccountable to English minds; but it may find a parallel in Lady Chatterton's story of the Irish parents, [7] who, after refusing to spend fourpence in nourishment for a dying child, came in deep grief after its death to their employer, to solicit an advance of thirty shillings to _wake the corpse_! Perhaps some ingenious systematists might hence deduce a fresh argument in favour of the alleged oriental origin of the Irish.

[7] Rambles in the South of Ireland; ii. 143.

The colonel's next stage was to Moradabad, another Pathan city, but under the _raj_ of the Company, where, in a visit to a native original, named Meer Mahommed, he was greatly delighted by his new friend's introduction of the English word _swap_ into a sentence of Hindoostani. And on the 25th he reached Dhampore, where the welcome proclamation, "that the new moon had been seen," terminated the fast of the Ramazan, to the uncontrollable joy of the Mussulmans, who would have been subjected to another day's abstinence if it had not been perceived till the succeeding evening. The colonel, however, slyly remarks, that "it was very odd that the _Hindoos_ could not see the new moon," and hints that their imperfection of vision was shared by himself, but it was otherwise decided by the Faithful; and he proceeded, amid the noisy rejoicings of the Moslem feast of _Bukra-Eed_, (called by the Turks Bairam,) by Najeena, the Birmingham of Upper India, to Nujeebabad. Here resided, on a pension of 60,000 rupees (£6000) a-year from the English government, the Nawab Gholam-ed-deen, better known by the nickname of Bumbo Khan, a brother of the once famous Rohilla chief Gholam-Khadir. Though past eighty years of age, and weighing upwards of twenty stone, he had not lost, any more than the equiponderant colonel, his taste for the good things of this world; and our traveller, on partaking of the Nawab's hospitality, records with infinite zest the glories of a peculiar preparation of lamb, called _nargus_, or the narcissus. But, alas! the reminiscences of the nargus were less grateful than the fruition, and the remorse of the colonel's guilty stomach (as poor Theodore Hooke, or some one else, used to call indigestion) continued to afflict him all the way to Hurdwar; and may probably account, by the consequent irritation of his temper, for various squabbles in which he was involved on the route.

The great fair of Hurdwar was in full swing at the colonel's arrival, with its vast concourse of Hindoo devotees from all parts of India, to whom it is in itself a spot of peculiar sanctity, besides lying in the way to the shrine of Gungotree, (the source of the Ganges,) in the Himmalaya--its crowds of merchants and adventurers of all sorts, even from Uzbek Tartary and the remote regions of Central Asia--Seiks by thousands from the Punjab, with their families--Affghan and Persian horse-dealers--and numerous grandees, both of the Hindoo and Moslem faith, who repair hither as to a scene of gaiety and general resort. The colonel found quarters in the tent of a friend employed in the purchase of horses for government, and seems to have entered with all his heart into the humours of the scene; his description of which, and of the varied characteristics of the motley groups composing the half million of human beings present, is one of the most graphic and picturesque sketches in his work. "Huge heaps of assafoetida, in bags, from the mountains beyond Cabool--tons of raisins of various sorts--almonds, pistachio nuts, sheep with four or five horns--Balkh[8] cats, with long silken hair; of singular beauty--faqueers begging, and abusing the uncharitable with the grossest and most filthy language--long strings of elderly ladies, proceeding in a chant to the priests of the Lingam, to bargain for bodily issue--Ghât priests presenting their books for the presents and signatures of the European visitors--groups of Hindoos surrounding a Bramin, who gives each of them a certificate of his having performed the pilgrimage"--such are a few of the component parts of the scene; but the colonel's attention seems to have been principally fixed upon the horses, and the tricks of the _dulals_ or brokers, to whom the purchase is generally confided, it being almost hopeless for an European to make a personal bargain with a native dealer. But among the greatest curiosities in this way were some _tortoiseshell_ ponies--for we can call them nothing else--a peculiar race from Uzbek Tartary, which we never remember to have heard of before. "They were under thirteen hands high, and the most curious compound of colours and marks that can be imagined. Suppose the animal pure, snowy white; cover the white with large, irregular, light bay spots through which the white is visible; in the middle of these light bay let there be dark bay marbled spots; at every six or eight inches plant rhomboidal patches of a very dark iron-grey; then sprinkle the whole with dark flea-bites! There's a _phooldar_, ( flower-market,) as they call them;" and we agree with the colonel that such an animal would be a fortune at Bartlemy fair.

[8] In the original "bulkh," which we have ventured to amend as above. The Oriental words and phrases are, in several instances, very incorrectly printed; but whether the fault rests with the colonel's "undecipherable" MS., or the correctors of the press, it is not for us to decide.

Among the distinguished visitors to Hurdwar at this season of festivity was the noted Begum Sombre, or Sumroo, whose face the colonel compares to that of an old Scotch highlander, and her person to a sackful of shawls, and who declared "that the Duke of Wellington _must_ be at heart a Catholic, _because_ he emancipated the Catholics!" He also renewed his gastronomic friendship with his friend Bumbo Khan, with whom the recollections of past indigestion did not prevent him from feasting on _mahaseer_, a delicious fish found in this part of the Ganges; and on this occasion his Apician ecstasies are not alloyed by subsequent regrets--"even now the recollection soothes me"--and he recommends such of his readers as are yet ignorant of this luxury to start forthwith for Hurdwar and repair the omission. The fair ended April 13; and the colonel having previously succeeded in disposing of his buggy to a potentate whom he calls "the Kheerea Thunnasir Rajah," (we believe, the ruler of one of the Seik protected states,) and buying a stout Turcomani pony for the hills, started the same day on the road to Suharunpoor. He favours his readers, _en passant_, with some exceedingly original speculations touching the Mosaic deluge, in reference to the hills about Hurdwar, which do not speak very highly for his attainments in geology, though in some other branches of natural history, and particularly in botany, he appears to be no mean proficient. The journey was disturbed by attempts to steal the colonel's new purchase, (which was not, like the rest of the stud, distinguished from the horses of the country by having its tail cut,) and by a quarrel at Secunderpore with a thannadar, or native police magistrate, whose European superior's neglect of the colonel's complaint he charitably attributes to "some (I hope slight) derangement of the stomach." At Suharunpore he visited the well-known botanist Dr Royle, the curator of the Company's botanic garden there, then engaged in those labours on the Flora of the Himmalayas which have been since given to the world; and at Boorea, leaving the British territory, he entered that of the protected Seik states, whose petty chieftains are secured in their semi-independence by the treaty with Runjeet in 1809, which confined the ruler of Lahore to the right bank of the Sutlej. But their reception of the colonel did not appear to indicate any great degree of gratitude for these favours to the British nation, as represented in his person; for not one of the five Seik chiefs, "each of whom has his own snug little fort close to the city," would supply him with a lodging; and it was only by perseverance and ingenuity that he secured a place to lay his head, after long wrangling with the subordinate functionaries. Matters improved, however, as he advanced further into the country; and, at the little mountain-city of Nahun, he was most hospitably received and entertained by the young rajah, Futteh Pur Grass Sing, "who had been educated almost entirely under the kind and fatherly superintendence of Captain Murray," the commissioner of the Seik states, and whose frank and gentlemanlike manners, "so unlike those of the ghee-fed wretches of the plains," did honour to his guardian's precepts. The town of Nahun, which is 3600 feet above the level of the sea, is described as clean and well paved; and the rajah, whose revenue had been increased under the management of Captain Murray from 37,000 to 53,000 rupees, was highly popular, and by the colonel's account deservedly so, with his subjects. He earnestly pressed "the fat gentleman" (whose caution in mounting an elephant, while two men on the other side of the howdah balanced his weight, vehemently excited his risibility) to return to the plains through Nahun, and have a month's shooting with him in the valley; but whether the invitation was accepted or not remains untold, as--"Alas for the literature of the age! when I was ordered to Bundelcund, a vile thief entered my tents at night, and robbed me of my second volume; and thus did I lose my carefully written account of the sub-Himmalayan range, which cost me fully eight months' labour."

Thus abruptly terminates the first part of the colonel's travels, and at the commencement of the second we find him crossing the Jumna to Calpee, the frontier town of Bundelcund, a wild and unsettled province, prolific in Thugs and bad characters of all sorts, and principally inhabited by a peculiar race called Bundelas, who have never been perfectly reconciled to the British supremacy, and who, at this present writing, are kept quiet only by the presence of a force of 15,000 men. Calpee is said to be the hottest place in India, the thermometer in June, according to the colonel, standing even on a cloudy day at 145 degrees--a degree of heat almost incredible; and it is also the principal mart for the cotton, which the rich black soil of Bundelcund produces of finer quality than any other part of Hindostan. But, notwithstanding its commercial inportance, the town was at this time left to the government of a native Darogah or chief of police, the nearest European courts being at Hameerpore, thirty miles distant, and the state of society seems to have been somewhat singular. Among its most conspicuous members is "Gopal, the celebrated robber, murderer, and smuggler, a tall athletic man about forty-two years of age, with a most hideous muddy eye, having the glare of hell itself. It is said that he has always fifteen servants in stated pay, and can in a few hours command the services of three hundred armed and desperate men; and the strength and vigour of the Calpee police may be estimated by the fact, that he has been known to walk into the house of a rich merchant in the centre of the town, when he was surrounded by his servants and family; he has very coolly selected the gold bangles of his children, and silenced the trembling remonstrances of the Mahajun by threats of vengeance; nor is this a solitary instance. When he murders, he is equally above all concealment; as in the recent case of a sepahee returning home with his savings, who was waylaid and murdered by our hero in open day. He very coolly gave himself up, acknowledging that he had killed the sepahee, who had first assaulted him. It was proved on the trial, that the sepahee was wholly unarmed, and he was condemned to be hung by the court of Hameerpore on his own confession, but released, _from want of evidence_, by the Sudder Court at Calcutta. Their objection was excellent, though curious; that if his confession was taken, it must be taken altogether, and not that part only which could lead to his conviction. He was released, and now walks about in his Sunday clothes, a living evidence of British tenderness."

Gopal was not the only amiable character with whom the colonel became acquainted at Calpee, as he sought and obtained an interview with a famous Thug approver, who had retired from the active exercise of his profession, and was travelling the country in company with a party of police, denouncing his former associates to justice. We cannot help suspecting, both from the traits recorded of him, and from the vicinity of Calpee to his former residence at Jalone, that this personage was no other than the celebrated Ameer Ali, whose adventures formed the ground of Captain Meadows Taylor's well-known "Confessions of a Thug;" and as a pendant to the already published descriptions of him, we here quote the impression he made upon the colonel. "I expected to see a great man, but at the first glance I saw that I was in the presence of a master. The Thug was tall, active, and slenderly formed; his head was nearly oval; his eye most strongly resembled that of a cobra di capello; its dart was perfectly wild and maniacal, restless, brilliant, metallic, and concentrated." The colonel had a narrow escape from irretrievably affronting this eminent professor of murder, by unguardedly enquiring whether he was in any way cognizant of a trifling robbery by which the colonel himself had been a sufferer. "No, sir!" he exclaimed with a look which might have frozen a less innocent querist; "murder, not robbery, is my profession ... and none but the merest novices would descend so low as to rob a tent or a dwelling-house." The colonel, however, expresses a shrewd suspicion, from circumstances which had come to his knowledge, that his distinguished visitor's _esprit de corps_ led him to deviate from truth in this particular--a belief in which Captain Taylor's pages fully bear him out.

The colonel's movements, after quitting Calpee and its attractive circles, appear to have been somewhat desultory. We find him, successively, at Murgaon or Murgong, Julalpore, Keitah, &c., without being told what decided his route; but from some subsequent remarks, it appears probable that he was engaged on engineering service by order of Government. Between Julalpore and Keitah he fell in with a gang of _nutts_[9] or gipsies, whom the beauty of their women (a point to which the colonel is always alive) did not prevent him from suspecting of an intention to practise _thuggee_ on his own portly person--a belief in which he was confirmed by hearing them speak _in another tongue_ among themselves--no doubt the _Ramasee_, or cant language of the Thugs, subsequently made known to the world at large by the investigations of Major Sleeman. At Goraree he purchased some small cups, carved from the variegated serpentine of the rock on which the town is built; but, on proposing to employ the artist in making some larger vases, "he told me that he was a very poor man, and his efforts had never been directed to larger patterns; meaning to infer that it was impossible he could either try or succeed!" Such is Hindoo nature!

[9] The Indian gipsies are several times mentioned in the journal of Bishop Heber, who says they are called Kunjas in Bengal. Colonel Davidson also mentions a race in Bundelcund called Kunjurs who were in the habit, as he was informed by the Bramins, of "catching lizards, scorpions, snakes, and foxes," which, if it is meant that they use them for food, is analogous to the omnivorous propensities of the gipsies.

Churkaree, the capital of Ruttun Sing Buhadoor, one of the principal of the numerous rajahs among whom Bundelcund is divided, is described as "prettily situated on the side of the hill, over a lake covered with the white lotus flower, and having a very fine appearance from a distance, as most of the houses have their upper stories whitewashed, and are seen peeping through the dark-green leafy trees of the country, but the town, which contains perhaps 15,000 souls, of whom 1000 may be Mussulmen, is very straggling, irregular, and dirty." The male population were all fiercely mustached, and loaded with arms; but their repulsive exterior was more than compensated by the charms of the other sex, all of whom wore immense hollow ankle bangles of zinc, filled with bits of gravel, which tinkled as they walked. "I have never seen so many well-formed and handsome women together as I did at the wells outside the town, drawing water _à la Rebecca_. Some of their faces were strikingly intelligent, and their figures eminently graceful. The population is almost purely Hindoo; and I think the Hindoo females are more delicate in their forms than the Mussulmanees." The Rajah was, however, absent on a sporting excursion, and the darogah refused to provide the colonel with lodgings, alleging his master's orders that no Feringhis should be allowed in the town; and it was not till after a long altercation, of which the colonel gives himself greatly the best, that he succeeded in finding quarters in the house of a _bunneea_ or grocer. But the next day's march (for Bundelcund is almost as thickly set with sovereign princes as Saxony itself) carried him out of the realm of this inhospitable potentate into the territories of the Rajah of Jalone, the once noted patron and protector of Thuggee, by whose agent he was most politely received at Mahoba, a once splendid but now ruined city, celebrated for its artificial lakes, which in long-past times were formed by a famous Rajpoot prince named Purmal, by damming up the narrow gorges of the hills. "Never had I seen, in the plains of India, a prospect more enchanting! Conceive a beautiful sheet of calm, clear, silvery water, of several miles in circumference, occasionally agitated by the splashing leaps of large fishes, or the gradual alighting of noble swan-like aquatic birds: its margin broken as if by the most skilful artist; now running into the centre, and ending in most romantic low rocky hills, covered with trees and embellished with black, antique Jain temples, deserted probably for hundreds of years, and at present the retreat of the elegant peafowl; in other places embanked with huge blocks of cut granite, embrowned by the shade of magnificent trees, under which small bright Hindoo temples, carefully whitewashed, might be seen in the shade; or bounded by abrupt rocky promontories, surmounted by many-pillared temples in ruins, hanging in the sky. A fine rich sunset gave an exquisite richness and classic magnificence to the scene. Many little boys with rod and line were ensnaring the sweet little _singhee_, or the golden _rohoo_ or carp--bringing back to my heart the days, when, stealing from school, I was wont to sit on the rocks of the Dee, at Craglug, near Aberdeen, watching the motion of a float that was not under water once in the twenty-four hours."

The colonel's laudable habit of associating freely, whenever opportunity occurred, with the natives, gave him considerable insight into the state of the country, where the caprices of the native princes were not then much interfered with, and which consequently, as he says, "was pretty much in the situation of the Emerald Isle;" and verily if the tale told him by the Hindoo _gosain_ or priest at Jourâhoô, of the murder of his predecessor in the temple, and the impunity of the robbers, were correctly related, the Bundelas have not much to learn in the arts of bloodshed and depredation. "This village being a sort of corner to the territories of several Rajahs, robberies, murders, and all other diversions, are of daily occurrence; and when enquiries are made; each territory throws the blame on its neighbour." The maxim of government most current in Bundelcund, both with rulers and ruled, seems indeed to have been--

"The good old rule, the simple plan, That those should take who have the power, And those should keep who can;"

for while this strange confusion of _meum_ and _tuum_ prevailed among the peasantry, the country was ruined by the oppressive and irregular exactions of the rajahs, both zemindars and cultivators flying from their habitations to escape the levying of the rents, which were often demanded more than once by different collectors. At Chundla, the colonel was lodged in the house of an opulent zemindar, who had absconded for the reason just given; "and one of the thanna servants told me, that, by those means, Bundelcund was depopulated"--a statement corroborated by the numerous ruined brick houses remaining in the towns among the miserable hovels of the present day. The rajahs of Bundelcund are, almost without exception, of Rajpoot lineage, and thus of a different race from their Bundela subjects; but the condition of the country is much the same wherever it is left under the sway of the Hindoo princes, who are exempt even from the partial restraint which the Koran imposes on the despotism of Mahommedan rulers. The only effectual cure for the evils reigning in Bundelcund will be its formal incorporation with the dominions of the Company--a consummation which, from the refractory spirit shown in the province after our losses in Affghanistan, is probably not far distant.

The remainder of the colonel's notes on Bundelcund relate principally to his visits to the ancient hill-fortresses of Ajeegur and Kalingur, both formerly occupied in force by the British, but now--with the exception of a havildar's (sergeant's) party of sepoys posted at the former, and a single company at the latter--garrisoned solely by the _lungoors_, or large black monkeys, whom the colonel found holding solemn assembly in the Jain temples and the hall of audience, built by the famous Rajah Purmal at Ajeegur. While exploring his way along the ruined and overgrown ramparts, he had a narrow escape from the fangs of a large venomous serpent, ("the _Katula Rekula Poda_, No. 7 of Russell,") on which he was on the point of treading, and which, in commendable gratitude for its forbearance; he allowed to glide off unharmed by his fowling-piece; "but he was the first reptile that ever escaped without the chance of losing his life at my hands." On the road to Kalingur he had an interview with a petitioner, who offered him 400 rupees in cash, or a large diamond, for his interest in a certain case then pending before the judge at Bandah; "but I explained to my client that I was not in that line of business, and as I saw he had no intention of insulting me, we parted friends." Kalingur, which was taken by the British after a long siege in 1812, stands on a rock towering "upwards of 850 feet above the plain below, and probably about 3000 feet above the level of the sea;" but its strength as a fortress is as nothing in comparison to its sanctity, which entitles every one, who resides there only as long as it takes to milk a cow, to especial beatitude--the object of veneration being a _lingam_ of black stone enshrined in a temple, the guardianship of which is jointly vested in five resident families of Bramins. "At this time," says the colonel, "the place is not worth keeping, the country being so thoroughly impoverished and desolate;" and he accordingly, after viewing the marvels of the locality, pursued his way to Banda, and thence _laid a dâk_ (or travelled by palanquin with relays of bearers) to Calpee, "there to sit from nine to four, writing filthy accounts of bricks and mortar, square feet, cubic feet, and running feet, rupees, annas, and pie; squabbling with wrinkled unromantic villains, whose cool-tempered and overwhelming patience amply deserve their unlawful gains--I mean as labourers in the vineyard of villany."

"A sporting excursion in Oude," in the spring of 1836, comes next in order of time; and in regular order we accordingly take it, though it has pleased either Mr Colburn or the colonel to place it after the voyage down the Ganges. The colonel left Lucknow, March 2; and three days later the whole party rendezvoused at Khyrabad, consisting of "Mrs, Miss, and Brigadier Churchill, Colonel Arnold, Major Cureton, Lieut. Waugh, Dr Ross of her Majesty's 16th Lancers, and the writer of these amiable records;" to whom was soon after added, in the capacity of guide and hanger-on, "Sam Lall, by birth a Chuttree or Rajpoot, by profession a zemindar, and by inclination a sycophant and shikarree, (hunter.)" Indian field sports, with their concomitants of hogs, hogdeer, jungles, elephants, tigers, and nullahs, have been of late years rendered so familiar to stay-at-home travellers, that we shall but concisely notice the colonel's exploits in this forest campaign, which present no remarkable novelty, though detailed _con amore_, and with the two-fold zest of a sportsman and an epicure. With all deference, indeed, to the colonel, we have shrewd doubts whether the latter feeling was not the predominant one; for the death of a tiger, nine of which fell during the three weeks' foray before the rifles of himself and his companions, is evidently chronicled with less of heart-felt enthusiasm than characterises his encomiums on the hogdeer soup, the delicate floricans and black partridges, (in the preparation of bread sauce, for which, with his own hands, he earned immortal renown,) and the other materials for good living poured forth from the cornucopia of an Indian game-bag. His gastronomic fervour during this jaunt reaches at times an ecstatic pitch, which, as old Weller says, "werges on the poetical." "For him (the gastronomist) the dark rocks and arid plains of the dry Dekkan produce their purple grapes, and cunning but goodly bustard; for him burning Bundelcund its wonderful rock pigeon and ortolan inimitable; the Jumna, most ancient of rivers, its large rich Kala banse, and tasty crabs; for him yields the low and marshy Terace her elegant florican; the mighty Gunga its melting mahaseer; the Goomtee its exquisite mullet. And shall he not eat and delight in her fruits? ... Let the ass eat its thistles, and the swallow its flies _au naturel_; you and I, reader, know better!"

One day, while wading on their elephants through a deep marsh in pursuit of a tiger, the chasseurs suddenly stumbled upon a pleasant family party--"a labyrinth of huge boa-constrictors or pythons, sound asleep, floating on a bed of crushed _nurkool_, (a gigantic species of reed,) the least of them twenty feet long, and two feet in circumference. A more beautiful natural mosaic cannot be imagined: they appeared, from being wet, as if recently varnished. Perhaps they were from twenty to thirty in number, and occupied a spot of about twenty feet square. No sooner did the dreadful glistening reptiles hear the click of my rifle, and feel its ball, than they shot forth with all their vigour, and diving, disappeared in an instant under the matted roots of the tall nurkool, and, although I tried, I could not get another glimpse." One of these giant serpents, seventeen feet long, and eighteen inches in circumference, which the colonel calls a small one, was shot a few days afterwards by Colonel Arnold. The marsh and jungle swarmed with peacocks, jungle-fowl, and wild-fowl of all sorts, affording glorious sport; and, besides the smaller kinds of deer, several specimens occurred of a magnificent species of stag with twelve-tyned horns, called _baru-singa_--apparently allied to the _sambur_ and _rusa_ of the Dekkan. The comparatively small number of tigers killed was, however, a source of disappointment; since the utility of these battues, in which the superior fire-arms and appliances of the English are brought into action for the destruction of these ferocious animals, may be estimated from the damage done by them in the wilder parts of India, "which is beyond the belief even of Indo-European residents, and must, consequently, appear an exaggeration to distant Englishmen. General (then Captain) Briggs, when resident at Dhoolia in Candeish, in 1821, where his potails, or head men, were obliged to keep a register of the oxen (exclusive of sheep and goats) destroyed in their villages, reported that no less than 21,000 had been killed in three years! As no register is kept in Oude, it is impossible to register the number."

On the banks of the Mohun-nuddee the party was joined by Rajah Ruttun Sing, a chief holding a considerable tract of country under the suzerainté of Oude, who favoured them with his company while they remained in his district--a compliment which he expected to be acknowledged, as he distinctly intimated on taking leave, by the gift of a valuable fowling-piece; but this modest request was parried by the rejoinder, that none of their guns were good enough for his highness! During one of the halts, an incident occurred which strongly illustrates the inhuman apathy of the Hindoos towards any one not connected with them by the ties of caste. A man was found sitting under a tree near the camp, uttering strange cries, and the servants were desired to order him to withdraw; "they returned, saying carelessly that he was a _nutt_, or gipsy, who had been robbed." A robbery _from_ a gipsy was such a strange contradiction of terms, that the colonel went personally to enquire into the matter, when he was horror-struck by finding, that the man had been, not only plundered of his earnings by a band of Bunjarras, but frightfully mutilated and wounded, a trifle which the Hindoo servants had not thought worth mentioning. The poor wretch's arm was amputated by Dr Ross; and, being carried with the camp and carefully tended, he was at last dismissed, with a fair prospect of recovery, and with a gift of sixty rupees subscribed among the party; but not even the example of the _sahibs_ could teach the Hindoos humanity, and only the peremptory commands of Dr Ross could prevail upon his bearer to place a mattress under the sufferer! On their return march, the party were further honoured by visits from several rajahs and zemindars, all of whom were "loud in complaint against the extortions of the aumils, who constantly attempted to gather more, and sometimes twice and a half as much, as the stipulated rent, in consequence of which the zemindars were compelled to rebel;" a view of the political condition of Oude which naturally results from its anomalous position, under a sovereign nominally independent, who is at once too weak to control his own subjects, and fearful of diminishing the shadow of authority left to him by calling in the only available aid. On the 29th of March the party again reached Khyrabad, the appointed place of their separation, as it had been of their meeting; and here the narrative, as before, breaks off abruptly.

The concluding part, in order of time, of the colonel's lucubrations, contains his narrative of a voyage on the Ganges, from Allahabad, by Dhacca, to Calcutta; but the features and incidents of this navigation have been so frequently described by travellers of all sorts and kinds, from Bishop Heber and Captain Bellew to our own much-esteemed Kerim Khan, that we shall devote but brief space to it. He quitted Allahabad, as he informs us, December 5, 1839, so deeply regretted by the native population, that they determined to perpetuate his memory by the erection of a new ghât or landing-place, every brick of which was to be stamped with the