the Supreme Government should be made known; and the
handsome lad, Krishan Rao, whom the old woman wished to adopt, and
whom I had often seen at Sagar, was at my request brought in and
seated by my side. By him I sent my message of condolence to the
widow and mother of his deceased uncle, couched in the usual terms--
that the happy effects of good government in the prosperity of this
city, and the comfort and happiness of the people, had extended the
fame of the family all over India; and that I trusted the reigning
member of that family, whoever he might be, would be sensible that it
was his duty to sustain that reputation by imitating the example of
those who had gone before him. After attar of roses and pan had been
handed round in the usual manner, I went to the summit of the highest
tower in the castle, which commands an extensive view of the country
around.

The castle stands upon the summit of a small hill of syenitic rock.
The elevation of the outer wall is about one hundred feet above the
level of the plain, and the top of the tower on which I stood about
one hundred feet more, as the buildings rise gradually from the sides
to the summit of the hill. The city extends out into the plain to the
east from the foot of the hill on which the castle stands. Around the
city there is a good deal of land, irrigated from four or five tanks
in the neighbourhood, and now under rich wheat crops; and the gardens
are very numerous, and abound in all the fruit and vegetables that
the people most like. Oranges are very abundant and very fine, and
our tents have been actually buried in them and all the other fruits
and vegetables which the kind people of Jhansi have poured in upon
us. The city of Jhansi contains about sixty thousand inhabitants, and
is celebrated for its manufacture of carpets.[11] There are some very
beautiful temples in the city, all built by Gosains, one [_sic_] of
the priests of Siva who here engage in trade, and accumulate much
wealth.[12] The family of the chief do not build tombs; and that now
raised over the place where the late prince was buried is dedicated
as a temple to Siva, and was made merely with a view to secure the
place from all danger of profanation.[13]

The face of the country beyond the influence of the tanks is neither
rich nor interesting. The cultivation seemed scanty and the
population thin, owing to the irremediable sterility of soil, from
the poverty of the primitive rock from whos