g's affections.

On the King's paying a visit of ceremony to Mulika Zumanee one
evening, he asked for water, and it was brought to him in a gold cup,
on a silver tray, by the Kuduseea Begum, then one of the women in
waiting. Her face was partially unveiled; and the King, after
drinking, threw the last few drops from the cup over her veil in
play. In return, she threw the few drops that had been spilled on the
salver upon the King's robe, or vest. He pretended to be angry, and
asked her, with a frown, how she could dare to besprinkle her
sovereign; she replied--"When children play together there is no
distinction between the prince and the peasant." The King was charmed
with her half-veiled beauty and spirit, and he paid a second visit
the next day, and again asked for water. He did the same as the first
day, and she returned the compliment in the same way. He came a third
time and asked for water, but Mulika Zumanee had become alarmed, and
it was presented by another and less dangerous person. A few days
after, however, the Queen was constrained to allow her fair attendant
to attend the King, and receive from him formal proposals of
marriage, which she accepted.

She was handsome and generous; but there was no discrimination in her
bounty, and she is said to have received from the King nearly two
millions of money out of the reserved treasury for pin-money alone.
Of this she saved forty-four lacs of rupees. The King never touched
this money, and it formed, in a separate apartment, the greater part
of the seventy lacs found in his reserved treasury on his death, out
of the ten krores or ten millions sterling, which he found there when
he ascended the throne in 1827.

She is said to have been the only one of his wives who ever had any
real affection for the King. She was haughty and imperious in her
temper; and the only female, who had any influence over her, was a
Mogulanee, who taught her to read and write. She assisted her
mistress very diligently in spending her pin-money, and made the
fortunes of sundry of her relations. Altercations between the
Kuduseea Begum and the King were not uncommon; but, on the 21st of
August, 1834, the King became unusually excited, and told her that he
had raised her from bondage to the throne, and could as easily cast
her back into the same vile condition. Her proud spirit could not
brook this, and she instantly swallowed arsenic. The King relented,
and every remedy was tried, but in