with what also comes from well-paid foreign service, are being steadily enriched, for the Sikh is too fond of his own country to settle abroad. All that can be saved goes to the homes. They do not waste money on the occasion of domestic ceremonies, as in other priest-ridden parts of India. As sons of the soil, the goal of their home ambition is land—more land and oxen to work it. Sikh wives are as free and independent as the men, and during the absence of the husbands remain at home in charge of affairs. On the annexation of the Punjab they were the first to appreciate the advantages of being subjects of the British Crown. When it became known that the English, who had conquered the Sikhs, were ruled by a Queen who was now their sovereign, they went in strongly for woman's rights and became a terror to tyrannical husbands. It is said that many a hard-fighting Sikh who had survived the battlefields found the scene of war shifted to his rebellious house, and again suffered grievous defeat.
