that this fair takes place at Bahraetch. All our Hindoo
camp followers paid as much reverence to the shrine as they passed as
the Mahommedans. It is a place without trade or manufactures; but a
good many respectable Mahommedan families reside in it, and have
built several small but neat mosques of burnt bricks. There is little
thoroughfare in the wretched road that passes through it.

The Hindoos worship any sign of manifested might or power, though
exerted against themselves, as they consider all might and power to
be conferred by the Deity for some useful purpose, however much that
purpose may be concealed from us. "These invaders, however merciless
and destructive to the Hindoo race, say they must have been sent on
their mission by God for some great and useful purpose, or they could
not possibly have succeeded as they did: had their proceedings not
been sanctioned by Him, he could at any moment have destroyed them
all, or have interposed to arrest their progress." These, however,
are the speculations of only the thinking portion. At the bottom of
the respect shown to such Mahommedan shrines, by the mass of Hindoos,
there is always a strong ground-work of _hope_ or _fear_: the soul or
spirit of the savage old man, who had been so well supported on
earth, must still, they think, have some influence at the Court of
Heaven to secure them good or work them evil, and they invoke or
propitiate him accordingly. They would do the same to the tomb of
Alexander, Jungez Khan, Tymour, or Nadir Shah, without any perplexing
inquiries as to their creed or liturgy.

_February 28_, 1850.--Chinahut, eleven miles west, over a plain
intersected by several small streams, the largest of which is the
Rete, near Sutrick. There is a good deal of kunkur-lime in the ground
over which we have passed today; but the tillage is good where the
land is at all level, and the crops are fine. The plain is cut up
here and there by some ravines, but they are small and shallow, and
render but a small portion of the surface unfit for tillage. The
banks of the small streams are, for the most part, cultivated up to
the water's edge.

We passed the Rete over a nice bridge, built by Rajah Bukhtawar Sing
twenty-five years ago, at a cost of twenty-five thousand rupees, out
of his own purse. He told me that one morning, in the rains, he came
to the bank of this river, on his way to Lucknow from Jeytpoor, a
town which we passed yesterday, and found it so swolle