[A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II by William Sleeman]@TWC D-Link book
A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II

CHAPTER II
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He, therefore, recommended the King to take from the two brothers the sum of twenty-five lacs of rupees, leave them the estates, and restore Dursun Sing to all his charges, as soon as it could be done without any risk of giving umbrage to the British Government.
The King thought the minister's advice judicious, and consented; but the ladies called him a fool, and told him, that the brothers had more than that sum in stores of seed-grain alone, and ought to be made to pay at least fifty lacs, while the brothers pleaded poverty, and declared that they could only pay nineteen.

The minister urged the King, to take even this sum, give two lacs to the three females, and send seventeen to the reserved treasury; and called upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give in his accounts of the actual balance due by the two brothers, on their several contracts, for the last twenty-five years.

He, being on good terms with the minister, and anxious to meet his wishes, found a balance of only one lac and thirty-two thousand due by Dursun Sing, and one of only fifteen lacs due by his brother, Bukhtawar Sing, in whose name the contracts had always been taken up to 1842.

The King, sorely pressed by the females, resolved to banish Dursun Sing, and confiscate all his large estates; but the British Resident interposed, and urged, that Dursun Sing should be leniently dealt with, since he had made all the reparation and atonement required.

The King told him, that Dursun Sing was a notorious and terrible tyrant, and had fearfully oppressed his poor subjects, and robbed them by fraud, violence, and collusion, of lands yielding a rent-roll of many lacs of rupees a-year; and, that unless he were punished severely for all these numerous atrocities, his other servants would follow his example, and his poor subjects be everywhere ruined! The Resident admitted the truth of all these charges; but urged, in reply, that the Oude government had, in spite of all these atrocities, without any admonition, continued to employ him with unlimited power in the charge of many of its finest districts, for twenty-five or thirty years; and, that it would now be hard to banish him, and confiscate all his fine estates, when his Majesty had so lately offered, not only to leave them all untouched, but to restore him to all his charges, on the payment of a fine of twenty-five lacs.
The King was perplexed in his desire to please the Resident, meet the wishes of his three ladies, and add a good round sum to his reserved treasury; and at last closed all discussions by making Dursun Sing pay the one lac and thirty-two thousand rupees, found to be due by him, and sending him into banishment; holding Bukhtawar Sing responsible for the fifteen lacs due by him, and seizing upon his estates, and putting them under the management of Hoseyn Allee, the father of Hoseynee Khanum, the most influential of the three favourites, till the whole should be paid.


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