The extensive level plains through which the rivers of Central India[16] generally cut their way have, for the most part, been the beds of immense natural lakes;[17] and there rivers sink so deep into their beds, and leave such ghastly chasms and ravines on either side, that their waters are hardly ever available in due season for irrigation.  It is this characteristic of the rivers of Central India that makes such lakes so valuable to the people, particularly in seasons of drought.[l8] The river Nerbudda has been known to rise seventy feet in the course of a couple of days in the rains; and, during the season when its waters are wanted for irrigation, they can nowhere be found within that [distance] of the surface; while a level piece of ground fit for irrigation is rarely to be met with within a mile of the stream.[19]

The people appeared to improve as we advanced farther into Bundelkhand in appearance, manners, and intelligence.  There is a bold bearing about the Bundelas, which at first one is apt to take for rudeness or impudence, but which in time he finds not to be so.

The employes of the Raja were everywhere attentive, frank, and polite; and the peasantry seemed no longer inferior to those of our Sagar and Nerbudda territories.  The females of almost all the villages through which we passed came out with their Kalas in procession to meet us—­one of the most affecting marks of respect from the peasantry for their superiors that I know.  One woman carries on her head a brass jug, brightly polished, full of water; while all the other families of the village crowd around her, and sing in chorus some rural song, that lasts from the time the respected visitor comes in sight till he disappears.  He usually puts into the Kalas a rupee to purchase ‘gur’ (coarse sugar), of which all the females partake, as a sacred offering to the sex.  No member of the other sex presumes to partake of it, and during the chorus all the men stand aloof in respectful silence.  This custom prevails all over India, or over all parts of it that I have seen; and yet I have witnessed a Governor-General of India, with all his suite, passing by this interesting group, without knowing or asking what it was.  I lingered behind, and quietly put my silver into the jug, as if from the Governor-General.[20]

The man who administers the government over these seven villages in all its branches, civil, criminal, and fiscal, receives a salary of only two hundred rupees a year.  He collects the revenues on the part of Government; and, with the assistance of the heads and the elders of the villages, adjusts all petty matters of dispute among the people, both civil and criminal.  Disputes of a more serious character are sent to be adjusted at the capital by the Raja and his ministers.  The person who reigns over the seven villages of the lake is about thirty years of age, of the Rajput caste, and, I think, one of the finest young men I have ever seen.  His ancestors