Chapter 64. After the Execution of Shams-Ud-Dîn, the Estate of the

criminal was taken possession of by Government, and the town of Fîrôzpur is now the head-quarters of a sub-collectorship of the Gurgâon district in the Panjâb. The Delhi territories were placed under the government of the Lieutenant-Governor of the Panjâb in 1858.

3. The Mewâtî depredations had gone on for centuries. The Sultân Balban (Ghiâs-ud-dîn, alias Ulugh Khan), who reigned from A.D. 1265- 87, temporarily suppressed them by punishments of awful cruelty, flaying the criminals alive, and so forth. The Mewâtîs now supply men to a few robber gangs, but are incapable of mischief on a large scale.

4. Delhi was most nobly defended against Holkâr by a very small force under Lieutenant-Colonel Burn, who 'repelled an assault, and defended a city ten miles in circumference, and which had ever before been given up at the first appearance of an enemy at its gates'.

The battle of Dîg was fought on November 13, 1804, by the division under the command of General Fraser on the one side, and Holkâr's infantry and artillery on the other. 'The 76th led the way, with its wonted alacrity and determination,' and forced its way into the village in advance of its supports. The fight resulted in the total defeat of the Marâthâs, who lost nearly two thousand men, and eighty- seven pieces of cannon. The English loss also was heavy, amounting to upwards of six hundred and forty killed and wounded, including the brave commander, who was mortally wounded, and survived the victory only a few days.

On the night of November 17, General Lake in person routed Holkâr and his cavalry, killing about three thousand men. The English loss on this occasion amounted to only two men killed, and about twenty wounded.

The fort of Dîg, with a hundred guns and a considerable quantity of ammunition and military stores, was captured on December 24 of the same year. (Thornton, History of British India, pp. 316-19, 2nd ed., 1859.)

5. Transcription note. This clause is not intelligible to the transcriber. The character '1' or 'I' appears in the text. Some words appear to be missing.

6. The author was grievously mistaken in supposing that India did not require 'a particle' of foreign capital. The railways, and the great tea, coffee, indigo, and other industries, built up and developed during the nineteenth century, and still growing, owe their existence to the hundreds of millions sterling of English capital poured into the country, and could not possibly have been financed from Indian resources. The author seems not to have expected the construction of railways in India, although when he wrote a beginning of the railway system in England had been made.

7. This sentiment is still potent, and explains the eagerness often shown by wealthy landholders of high social rank to obtain official appointments, which to the European mind seem unworthy of their acceptance.

8. Few readers are likely to accept this proposition.

9. This clause is not intelligible to the editor. The word 'revenue' probably is a misprint for 'aristocracy'.

10. The original edition prints, 'No man considers himself less respectable', which is nonsense.

11. This sentiment reads oddly in these days of social democracy and continual conflict between capital and labour.

12. The steady progress of Islam in Lower and Eastern Bengal, first made apparent by the census of 1872, has been confirmed by the enumerations of 1901 and 1911. The feeling that the religion of the Prophet gives its adherent a better position in both this world and the next than Hinduism can offer to a low-caste man is the most powerful motive for conversion. See Dr. James Wise's valuable treatise, 'The Muhammadans of Eastern Bengal' (J.A.S.B., Part III (1894), pp. 28-63), and the Census Reports from 1872 to 1911.

13. The author's whimsical notion that a development of commercial and manufacturing organization in India would cause converts to flock from all parts, and from all classes of the Hindoo community, has not been verified by experience. Much capital is now concentrated in the great cities, and the number of cotton, jute, and other factories is considerable, but Christian converts are not among the goods produced.

14. The modern commercial houses bring a large proportion of their capital from Europe.

15. The three Presidency Banks, the Bank of Bengal, the Bank of Madras, and the Bank of Bombay, in which the Indian Government is interested, are the leading Indian banks. The Bank of Bengal was opened in 1806. No bank in India is allowed to issue notes. The paper money in use is issued by the Paper Currency Department of the Government of India, and the notes are known as 'currency notes'. The issue of these notes began in 1862-3. (Balfour, Cyclopaedia, 3rd ed., s.v. 'Bank and Paper Currency'). Much Indian capital is now invested in joint-stock companies of every kind.

16. More correctly, Hodal.