him charge of a detached post, in which he could soon repay himself with a handsome profit.  A poor ‘peon’, who was to serve under others, and could never hope for an independent charge, would give five hundred rupees for an office which yielded him avowedly only four rupees a month.  All arrogated the right of search, and the state of Indian society and the climate were admirably suited to their purpose.  A person of any respectability would feel himself dishonoured were the females of his family to be seen, much less touched, while passing along the road in their palanquin or covered carnage; and to save himself from such dishonour he was everywhere obliged to pay these custom-house officers.  Many articles that pass in transit through India would suffer much damage from being opened along the road at any season, and be liable to be spoiled altogether during that of the rains; and these harpies could always make the merchants open them, unless they paid liberally for their forbearance.  Articles were rated to the duty according to their value; and articles of the same weight were often, of course, of very different values.  These officers could always pretend that packages liable to injury from exposure contained within them, among the articles set forth in the invoice, others of greater value in proportion to their weight.  Men who carried pearls, jewels, and other articles very valuable compared with their bulk, always depended for their security from robbers and thieves on their concealment; and there was nothing which they dreaded so much as the insolence and rapacity of these custom-house officers, who made them pay large bribes, or exposed their goods.  Gangs of thieves had members in disguise at such stations, who were soon able to discover through the insolence of the officers, and the fears and entreaties of the merchants, whether they had anything worth taking or not.

A party of thieves from Datiya, in 1882, followed Lord William Bentinck’s camp to the bank of the river Jumna near Mathura, where they found a poor merchant humbly entreating an insolent custom-house officer not to insist upon his showing the contents of the little box he carried in his carriage, lest it might attract the attention of thieves, who were always to be found among the followers of such a camp, and offering to give him anything reasonable for his forbearance.  Nothing he could be got to offer would satisfy the rapacity of the man; the box was taken out and opened.  It contained jewels which the poor man hoped to sell to advantage among the European ladies and gentlemen of the Governor-General’s suite.  He replaced his box in his carriage; but in half an hour it was travelling post-haste to Datiya, by relays of thieves who had been posted along the road for such occasions.  They quarrelled about the division; swords were drawn, and wounds inflicted.  One of the gang ran off to the magistrate at Sagar, with whom he had before been acquainted;[6] and he