gdom, especially Hardoi, are still tainted by the
old lawlessness.

The remarks on the fine feelings of devotion shown by the sepoys must
now be read in the light of the events of the Mutiny. Since that time
the army has been reorganized, and depends on Oudh for its recruits
much less than it did in the author's day.

15. Ujain (Ujjain, Oojeyn) is a very ancient city, on the river
Sipra, in Malwa, in the dominions of Sindhia, the chief of Gwalior.

16. Bhajpore in the author's text. The town referred to is Bhojpur in
the Shahabad district of South Bihar.

CHAPTER 24

Corn Dealers--Scarcities--Famines in India.

Near Tehri we saw the people irrigating a field of wheat from a tank
by means of a canoe, in a mode quite new to me. The surface of the
water was about three feet below that of the field to be watered. The
inner end of the canoe was open, and placed to the mouth of a gutter
leading into the wheat-field. The outer end was closed, and suspended
by a rope to the outer end of a pole, which was again suspended to
cross-bars. On the inner end of this pole was fixed a weight of
stones sufficient to raise the canoe when filled with water; and at
the outer end stood five men, who pulled down and sank the canoe into
the water as often as it was raised by the stones, and emptied into
the gutter. The canoe was more curved at the outer end than ordinary
canoes are, and seemed to have been made for the purpose. The lands
round the town generally were watered by the Persian wheel; but,
where it [_scil._ the water] is near the surface, this [_scil._ the
canoe arrangement] I should think a better method.[1]

On the 10th[2] we came on to the village of Bilgai, twelve miles over
a bad soil, badly cultivated; the hard syenitic rock rising either
above or near to the surface all the way--in some places abruptly, in
small hills, decomposing into large rounded boulders--in others
slightly and gently, like the backs of whales in the ocean-in others,
the whole surface of the country resembled very much the face of the
sea, not after, but really in, a storm, full of waves of all sizes,
contending with each other 'in most admired disorder'. After the dust
of Tehri, and the fatiguing ceremonies of its court, the quiet
morning I spent in this secluded spot under the shade of some
beautiful trees, with the surviving canary singing, my boy playing,
and my wife sleeping off the fatigues of her journey, was to me most
delightf