drawn by two half-starved, bare-ribbed bullocks. Upon his back he would place the more robust Seeputneedar, and upon his shoulders the Durputneedar; he, again, should sustain the well-fed Putneedar; and, seated upon his shoulders should be represented, to crown the scene, the big zemindar, that compound of milk, sugar, and clarified butter. … The poor ryot pays for all! He is drained by these middle-men; he is cheated by his banker out of twenty-four per cent, at least; and his condition is beyond description or imagination."
Dr. Spry attests the present continuance of those scenes of destitution and abject wretchedness which I have but a few pages back alluded to. He has seen the miserable creatures picking up the grains of corn from the soil of the roads. "I have seen," says he, "hundreds of famishing poor, traversing the jungles of Bundlecund, searching for wild berries to satisfy the cravings of hunger. Many, worn down by exhaustion or disease, die by the road-side, while mothers, to preserve their offspring from starvation, sell or give them to any rich man they can meet!" He himself, in 1834, was offered by such a mother her daughter of six years old for fourteen shillings!—vol. i. 297.
These are the scenes and transactions in our great Indian empire—that splendid empire which has poured out such floods of wealth into this country; in which such princely presents of diamonds and gold have been heaped on our adventurers; from the gleanings of which so many happy families in England[1] "live at
- ↑ Even so recently as 1827 we find some tolerably regal instances of regal gifts to our Indian representatives. Lord and Lady Amherst on a tour in the provinces arrived at Agra. Lady
