XXXVU
INTRODUCTION.
who flourished under the low caste government others, such as the Bisens of Gonda and Partabgarh, and many other leading clans of the north, appear to have been derived from old Chhattri or quasi-Chhsittri stocks, established for time out of mind on or near their present, settlements. But the nobler families, the Bais of Baiswara, the Bachgoti Chauhans of Sulfcanpur, the Sombansis of Partabgarh, and the Kalhans of Gonda, are distinctly proved by their traditions to have immigrated, the first two from the Duab, the Sombansis from near Allahabad, and the Kalhans from the far south-west. From this point forward any general sketch of the history of Oudh becomes a task of almost insurmountable difficulty. The record of facts, though copious and unbroken, descends in two streams, which hardly touch one another, and which it is often nearly impossible to connect. On the one hand, we have the tribes
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Muhammadan
historians, who give accounts of the great princes sent from the conquering camp at Delhi to rule a province which during the first period of Muhammadan occupation was of the first importance to the empire. From them we hear of the wars, the intrigues, the rebellions, the magnificence, and sometimes the vices of these royal lieutenants but the barren and uninteresting lists were written by men who had no sympathy with, or knowledge of the real inhabitants of the country a people from whom they were separated by a strange religion, unintelligible social customs, a foreign origin, and the contempt engendered by conPage after page may be turned over, and, except when quest. victory has to be recorded, or mention is made of crowning some by a powerful local chieftain to his Muhamlent assistance the madan overlord, the existence of the mass of the Hindu nation is On the relations which subsisted between absolutely ignored. princes, and between the latter and natural their and the people amount of the taxes, and how and by power, the the central paid, the maintenance of order they were whom, whom, and to left in almost complete darkness. of justice, we are and dispensation chronology, which enables us to is fairly exact What is of value a it is possible to disentanthat all dispose in something like order other source the of informaforms gle from the local tradition which silent with regard is as to the tion. As, however, this local tradition of the the subject people, foreign rulers as their historians were on it is extremely difficult to establish points of contact between the two. It may be said with certainty that the two records corresponded to two entirely distinct streams of history, and the Tatar khan and Hindu rdja represented two societies domiciled on the
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