Volume 1

Rambles and recollections of an Indian official / [Sir William Henry Sleeman].

  • William Henry Sleeman
Date:
1893
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Rambles and recollections of an Indian official / [Sir William Henry Sleeman]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    TEHRI at Tehri that these poor widows should be provided for, as they had, up to that time, been preserved by the good feeling of a little community of the lowest of castes, on whom they had been bestowed as a punishment worse than death, inasmuch as it would disgrace the whole class to which they belonged, the Parihar Rajputsd Tehri is a wretched town, without one respectable dwell- ing-house tenanted beyond the palace, or one merchant, or even shopkeeper of capital and credit. There are some tolerable houses unoccupied and in ruins ; and there are a few neat temples built as tombs, or cenotaphs, in or around the city, if city it can be called. The stables and accom- modations for all public establishments seem to be all in the same ruinous state as the dwelling-houses. The revenues of the state are spent in feeding Brahmans and religious mendicants of all kinds; and in such idle ceremonies as those at which the Raja and all his court have just been assisting—ceremonies which concentrate for a few days the most useless of the people of India, the devotee followers (Bairagis) of the god Vishnu, and tend to no purpose, either useful or ornamental, to the state or to the people. This marriage of a stone to a shrub^ which takes place every year, is supposed to cost the Raja, at the most moderate estimate, three lakhs of rupees a year, or one ^ fourth of his annual revenue.^ The highest officers of which his government is composed receive small beggarly salaries, hardly more than sufficient for their subsistence ; and the money they make by indirect means they dare not spend like gentlemen, lest the Raja might be tempted to take their lives in order to get hold of it. All his feudal barons are of the same tribe as himself, that is, Rajputs ; ^ The Parihars were the rulers of Bundelkhand before the Chandels. The chief of Uchhahara belongs to this clan. ^ Wealthy Hindoos, throughout India, spend money in the same ceremonies of marrying the stone to the shrub. [W. H. S.] Three lakhs of rupees were then worth thirty thousand pounds sterling or more.
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