he man then makes up a piteous story of his having spent the whole
ten months in prosecuting his claim in vain, when, in reality, he has
been enjoying himself at home, and had no claim whatever to settle.
The next year, or the year after, he gets another ten months' leave,
for the same purpose, and when it is about to expire, he presents
himself to the Resident, and declares that the local authorities have
been changed, and the new officers pay no regard to the King's
orders. New orders are then got for the new officers, and sent to his
regiment, and the same game is played over again.

Native officers and sipahees, in the privilege of presenting
petitions through the Resident, are now restricted to their own
claims and those of their wives, fathers, mothers, sons, and
daughters. They cannot petition through the Resident for the redress
of wrongs suffered, or pretended to have been suffered, by any other
relations. In consequence, it has become a common custom with them to
lend or sell their names to more remote relations, or to persons not
related to them at all. The petition is made out in their own name,
and the real sufferer or pretended sufferer, who is to prosecute the
claim, is named as the mookteear or attorney. A great many bad
characters have in this way deprived men of lands which their
ancestors had held in undisputed right of property for many
generations or centuries; for the Court, to save themselves from the
importunity of the Residency, has often given orders for the claimant
being put in possession of the lands without due inquiry or any
inquiry at all. The sipahees are, in consequence, much dreaded by the
people among whom they reside; for there really is no class of men
from whom it is more difficult to get the truth in any case. They
have no fear of punishment, because all charges against them for
fraud, falsehood, or violation of the rules laid down by Government
have to be submitted either to a court-martial, composed of native
officers, or to the Governor-General. Both involve endless trouble,
and it would, I fear, be impossible to get a conviction before a
court-martial so composed. No Resident will ever submit to a
Governor-General the scores of flagrant cases that every month come
before him; still less will he worry unoffending and suffering people
by causing them to be summoned to give evidence before a military
court.

In a recent instance (July 1851), a sipahee in a regiment stationed
a