threw it contemptuously aside; so contemptuously that he often did not deign to punish the offender. But, generally, looking at the career of the Mahárájá from the time that he securely established his throne after the capture of Múltán in 1818, it is astonishing to see with what fidelity he was served and how few of his officials turned against him. It is true, little was to be gained by revolt or treachery, for in every department of the State corruption was the rule. Officials might squeeze the peasantry at their pleasure so long as they paid their due proportion of the revenue into the royal treasury. The only limit to oppression was the resistance of the people which, in the hot-blooded Punjab, is certain to occur at a known and fixed point of the political thermometer. The Ját Sikh, or the Muhammadan of the Jehlam district, will not endure more than the normal and traditional amount of official robbery; when more than this was attempted, his hand and those of his clansmen flew to their swords and a good deal of trouble was the result. The Sikh Sirdárs were granted estates liable to feudal military service, and they maintained in addition a motley crew of armed followers of their own, and a semi-regal state within their own districts. To many of them were also assigned tracts of country to administer, although administration meant little more than the collection of the Government revenue. In these cases the whole work fell on the money-lender and the Bráhman land-agent, to whom the Sikh Sirdár assigned his responsibilities, deducting a large com-
