m the King of Persia to the King
of Oude, proposing to divide Hindoostan between them, and I thought
it to be my duty to tell him so, in order to warn him; but, as he
denied ever having received such letters, I told him that I should
take the word of a King, and say no more about it. He is certainly
not of sound mind, and things must, ere long, come to a crisis. His
mind may have been of an average kind when he was young, but it has
long become emasculated by over-indulgence; and the minister and his
minions can make him believe or do what they please. They know that
it cannot last long, and they have agents in Bombay and Calcutta to
assist them in fleecing the King of money on all manner of false
pretences.

The minister, a consummate knave, and one of the most incompetent men
of business that I have ever known, has all the revenues and
patronage of the country to distribute among those who have access to
the King exclusively--they are poets, fiddlers, eunuchs, and
profligate women; and every one of them holds, directly or
indirectly, some court or other, fiscal, criminal, or civil, through
which to fleece the people. Anything so detestable as the Government
I have nowhere witnessed, and a man less competent to govern them
than the King I have never known.

Had your Lordship left the choice of a successor to me, I should have
pointed out Colonel Outram; and I feel very much rejoiced that he has
been selected for the office, and I hope he will come as soon as
possible. There are many honest men at Lucknow, and a finer peasantry
no country can boast. But no honest man can obtain or retain office
under Government with the present minister and heads of departments.

But where the whole revenues of a fine country are available to
suborn witnesses to prove the King to be a _Solomon_, no Resident
would be able to find judicial proof of his being a fool; but that he
is so I have had abundance of, to me, satisfactory evidence ever
since I have been here. It must soon, however, become clear, without
the Resident's efforts to make it so. Where the Government of India
is so solemnly pledged to see justice done to the people of a
country, it cannot fairly permit them to be reigned over much longer
by so incompetent a Sovereign. Proofs enough of bad government and
neglected duties were given in my Diary; and a picture more true was,
I believe, never drawn of any country. The duty of remedying the
evils, and carrying out your Lor