th the
officers of the Court, placed seals on all the jewels and other
valuables belonging to the King and his establishments; and as the
night was very dark, placed torch-bearers at all places where they
appeared to be required.

Having made these arrangements the Resident returned with Dr.
Stevenson to the Residency, leaving Captain Paton at the palace; and
wrote to the Brigadier to request that he would send off the five
companies in advance to the palace direct, and bring down all his
disposable troops, including artillery, to the city. The distance
from the palace to the cantonments, round by the old stone bridge,
was about four miles and half. The iron bridge, which shortens the
distance by a mile and half, had not then been thrown over the
Goomtee river, which flows between them. The Resident then had drawn
up, for the consent of the new king, a Persian paper, declaring that
he was prepared to sign any new treaty for the better government of
the country that the British Government might think proper to propose
to him.

It was now one o'clock in the morning of the 8th of July, and Captain
Shakespear, attended by the Meer Moonshee, Iltufat Hoseyn, and the
Durbar Wakeel, proceeded to the house of the new sovereign, Nuseer-od
Dowlah, who then resided where the present King now resides, a
distance of about a mile from the Residency. The visit was altogether
unexpected; and, as the new sovereign had been for some time ill,
some delay took place in arranging for the reception of the mission.
After explaining the object of his visit. Captain Shakespear
presented the paper, which the King perused with great attention, and
then signed without hesitation. Captain Shakespear returned with it
to the Resident, who repaired again to the palace, and sent Captain
Paton, the first Assistant, to the Residency, to proceed thence with
Captain Shakespear and the Durbar Wakeel, to the house of the new
sovereign, and escort him to the palace, where he would be in
readiness to receive him. He arrived about three o'clock in the
morning, and being infirm from age, and exceedingly reduced from
recent illness, he was, after a short conversation with the Resident,
left in a small adjoining room, to repose for a few hours preparatory
to his being placed on the throne and crowned in due form. His eldest
surviving son, afterwards Amjud Allee Shah, his sons, the present
King, Wajid Allee Shah, and Mirza Jawad Khan, the King's foster
brother,