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excufe the wanderings and frailties of a poor horse, whose paffions receive no check from conftitutional modefty, or virtuous example.

From the

MEAHGUNGE, if I am informed right, was founded by Almas, and feems to be a thriving and populous village. various intelligence which I have procured, it is evident that the renter here is active, industrious, and regular. The inhabitants fay, that his rigour in collecting the revenue is, in a certain degree, qualified by a steady obfervance of his contracts.—I passed this evening in the company of a Patan, who was returning to his home from Lucknow, where he had expended the greatest part of his estate in the fociety of the ladies, and in the pleasures of arrack; but in the last he very copioufly indulged. In the courfe of two hours and a half, I beheld him with amazement empty two bottles of a spirit fo harsh and fiery, that the like dofe must have turned the head of an elephant. The Patan made an apology for this exceffive potation, by obferving, that it removed from his mind every fenfation of forrow and melancholy,-paffions, which, he faid greatly annoyed him in his cooler moments. This jovial Mahometan was attended by an old mufician, marvellously ill apparelled, and deficient in the larger portion of his teeth, who during the interludes of his master's amufement, ftrummed on a miferable guitar, which he accompanied with fome of Hafez's odes; but uttered in a voice that would have ftruck dismay into the fierceft beaft that ranges the foreft.

At

-At this gunge, a fervant whom I hired at Lucknow, and my only attendant, carried off, in the night, my matchlock and a curious dagger.

On the 20th, at Banghur Mow-10 coffes-a large village in the district of Almas.-Here the Patan having drunk out all the fubftance of his purse, fold a piece of family tin-plate; the produce of which raised the sum of three rupees. He took that evening an extraordinary draught of his favourite spirit; and, that his pleasures might have no alloy, he called in a good-natured girl, who for one half-rupee displayed to the Patan a more ample fund of dalliance and allurement, than could be purchased by us for twenty at Lucknow. He expreffed a fovereign contempt for Almas,* who he faid being precluded from the pleasures of the sex, disliked and difcouraged them. Many of Almas's wounded fepoys were brought into the ferauce from a fort in the woods, which had been reduced by him after a fiege of fix weeks. These men were shockingly mangled. Some had balls lodged in their bodies, others were fcorched by a combustible matter thrown on them during the attack.-Being poffeffed of a few medical materials, I applied dreffings to fuch cases as could likely receive any benefit from the affiftance and I was pleased to observe the successful effects of fome of the applications. The want of chirurgical help is an evil which affects, in a grievous manner, the native military fervice of Hindoftan, efpecially fince

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the ufe of fire-arms has become fo prevalent; and it will be no exageration to fay, that a greater number of the country troops are deftroyed by the effects of wounds, than flain in immediate

action.

AFTER a long journey of 14 coffes, in which I croffed the Ganges, and had nearly exhaufted the ftrength of my horse, I arrived on the 21ft at the ancient city of Kinnouge, fituate on the Callinuady, a small river that falls into the Ganges, about twenty miles below Furruckabad. Kinnouge, before the period of the Mahometan conqueft, ranked amongst the most populous and opulent cities of Hindoftan. It is mentioned in testimony of its grandeur, that Kinnouge contained thirty thousand fhops for the fale of betle, and afforded employment for fix thousand female dancers, and musicians. - A vast mass of ruins interspersed through a wide space, marks the ancient extent and grandeur of Kinnouge; though few diftinct veftiges now exift, except some parts of a ftone temple erected in ancient times to the honor of Setah, the wife of Ram, which has been exorcifed by fome zealous Mahometan, and converted into a place of worship. The prefent race of Indian Mahometans not being fervent in the cause of religion, or being rather fupinely regardless of it, (many of them holding memory of Mahomet in as little reverence as they would that of Thomas-a-Becket, had they ever heard of him) the mofque is now defiled and abandoned. In feveral cavities which the rain has formed, I obferved parts of brick wall, funk twenty feet at least

the

beneath

beneath the level of the town; and the inhabitants say, that in digging into the foundation, small pieces of gold and silver are often difcovered. They also say, that Kinnouge was once destroyed by an inundation; but as few Hindoo records are divested of mythological story, flender ufes only can be derived from them. The Mahrattas plundered this city, and laid waste the adjacent country, previously to the battle of Panifrett.* After this important event, which gave a ftrength and permanency to the Mahometan power in Upper India, Ahmed Khan Bungish, the chief of Furruckabad, took poffeffion of the diftricts of Kinnouge, which during his adminiftration, began to emerge from the ruin in which it had been long involved, and affumed symptoms of a recovery which are now wholly effaced.

ARRIVED on the 23d at Khodah Gunge, -nine coffes,—a village in the territory of Muzzuffer Jung, the adopted son of Ahmed Khan: but no more like the father, -excufe the phrase, — than "I am like Hercules."-This young man, averse to, or incapable of business, is a tributary of Affof-ud-Dowlah, who by the high fine he has impofed on Furruckabad, may be said to govern it himself.

ON the 24th, at Furruckabad -at Furruckabad-nine coffes.-Finding the pleasures of my Patan friend grow expensive, and very noisy, I

* It was fought in February, 1761.

took

took an eafy leave of him, and flipped unperceived into the English artillery camp, where I am treated, as I have been in all parts of this hofpitable country, with every mark of kind

nefs.

I am, my Dear Sir,

Yours, &c. &c.

LET

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