and they were so. Futteh
Morad soon after died, and his first wife turned the second, with her
first son, Roostum, and his wife, Dolaree, and the two sons which she
had borne to Futteh Morad--Futteh Allee Khan and Warus Allee Khan--
out of her house. They went to Futteh Morad's aunt, Bebee Mulatee, a
learned woman, who resided as governess in the house of Nawab
Mohubbet Khan, at Roostumnugger, near Lucknow, and taught his
daughters to read the Koran. Finding Dolaree to be not the most
faithful of wives to Roostum, she would not admit them into the
Nawab's house, but she assisted them with food and raiment; and
Roostum entered the service--as a groom--of a trooper in the King's
cavalry, called Abas Kolee Beg. Dolaree had given birth to a boy, who
was named Mahommed Allee; and she now gave birth to a daughter; but
she had cohabited with a blacksmith and an elephant-driver in the
neighbourhood, and it became a much "vexed question" whether the son
and daughter resembled most Roostum, the blacksmith, or the elephant-
driver; all, however, were agreed upon the point of Dolaree's
backslidings. Mahommed Allee, _alias_ Kywan Ja, was three years of
age, and the daughter, _Zeenut-on Nissa_, one year and half, when
some belted attendants from the palace came to Roostumnugger in
search of a wet-nurse for the young prince, Moona Jan, who had been
born the night before; and Bebee Mulatee, whose reputation for
learning had readied the royal family, sent off Dolaree as one of the
candidates for employment. Her appearance pleased the queen, the
Padshah Begum, the quality of her milk was pronounced by the royal
physicians to be first rate, and she was chosen, as wet-nurse for the
new-born prince.

Moona Jan's father (then heir-apparent to the throne of Oude) no
sooner saw Dolaree than, to the astonishment of the Queen and her
Court, he fell desperately in love with her, though she seemed very
plain and very vulgar to all other eyes; and he could neither repose
himself, nor permit anybody else in the palace to repose, till he
obtained the King's and Queen's consent to his making her his wife,
which he did in 1826. She soon acquired an entire ascendancy over his
weak mind, and, anxious to surround herself in her exalted station by
people on whom she could entirely rely, she invited the learned Bebee
Mulatee and her daughter, Jumeel-on Nissa, and her son, Kasim Beg, to
the palace, and placed them in high and confidential posts. She
invit