May 1st.—She sent for me, and I found the Gaja Rājā ill of fever, and suffering greatly from the intense heat.
May 9th.—Was the Sohobut Melā, or Fair of Kites, in Alopee Bāgh; I went to see it; hundreds of people, in their gayest dresses, were flying kites in all directions, so happily and eagerly; and under the fine trees in the mango tope, sweetmeats, toys, and children’s ornaments, were displayed in booths erected for the purpose. It was a pretty sight, that Alopee ke Melā.
The kites are of different shapes, principally square, and have no tails; the strings are covered with mānjhā, a paste mixed with pounded glass, and applied to the string, to enable it to cut that of another by friction. One man flies his kite against another, and he is the loser whose string it cut. The boys, and the men also, race after the defeated kite, which becomes the prize of the person who first seizes it. It requires some skill to gain the victory; the men are as fond of the sport as the boys.
The string of a kite caught tightly round the tail of my horse Trelawny, and threatened to carry away horse and rider tail foremost into mid-air! The more the kite pulled and danced about, the more danced Trelawny, the more frightened he became, and the tighter he tucked in his tail; the gentleman who was on the horse caught the string, and bit it in two, and a native disengaged it from the tail of the animal. A pleasant bite it must have been, that string covered with pounded glass! Yah! yah! how very absurd! I wish you had seen the tamāshā. In the evening we dined with Sir Charles Metcalfe; he was residing at Papamhow. He told me he was thinking of cutting down the avenue of nīm trees (melia azadirachta), that led from the house to the river; I begged hard that it might be spared, assuring him that the air around nīm trees was reckoned wholesome by the natives, while that around the tamarind was considered very much the contrary. In front of my rooms, in former days, at Papamhow, was a garden, full of choice plants, and a very fine young India-rubber tree; it was pleasant to see the bright green of the large glossy leaves of the caoutchouc tree, which flourished so luxuriantly. In those days, many flowering trees adorned the spot; among which the katchnar (bauhinia), both white and rose-coloured and variegated, was remarkable for its beauty. Sir Charles had destroyed my garden, without looking to see what trees he was cutting down; he had given the ruthless order. I spoke of and lamented the havoc he had occasioned; to recompense me, he promised to spare the avenue; which, when I revisited it years afterwards, was in excellent preservation.
14th.—The Bāiza Bā’ī sent for me in great haste; she was in alarm respecting the Gaja Rājā, who was ill of epidemic fever. Having lost her daughter, the Chimna Bā’ī, of fever, when she was driven out of Gwalior by her rebellious subjects, she was in the utmost distress, lest her only remaining hope and comfort, her young grand-daughter, should be taken from her. I urged them to call in European medical advice; they hesitated to do so, as a medical man might neither see the young Princess, nor feel her pulse. I drove off, and soon returned with the best native doctress to be procured; but, from what I heard at the consultation, it may be presumed her skill is not very great.
The Nawāb Hakīm Menhdī is very ill; I fear his days are numbered.
The murder of Mr. Frazer, by the Nawāb Sumshoodeen, at Delhi, who bribed a man called Kureem Khan to shoot him, took place when I was at Colonel Gardner’s; no one could believe it when suspicion first fell upon the Nawāb; he had lived on such intimate terms with Mr. Frazer, who always treated him like a brother. The Nawāb was tried by Mr. Colvin, the judge, condemned and executed. The natives at Allahabad told me they thought it a very unjust act of our Government, the hanging the Nawāb merely for bribing a man to murder another, and said, the man who fired the shot ought to have been the only person executed. On Sunday, the 13th March, 1835, Kureem Khan was foiled in his attempt on Mr. Frazer’s life, as the latter was returning from a nāch, given by Hindoo Rāo, the brother of the Bāiza Bā’ī. He accomplished his purpose eight days afterwards, on the 22nd of the same month. In the Hon. Miss Eden’s beautiful work, “The Princes and People of India,” there is a sketch of Hindoo Rāo on horseback; his being the brother of the Bāiza Bā’ī is perhaps his most distinguishing mark; I have understood, however, he by no means equals the ex-Queen of Gwalior in talent.
June 7th.—Sir Charles Metcalfe gave a ball to the station: in spite of all the thermantidotes and the tattīs it was insufferably hot; but it is remarkable, that balls are always given and better attended during the intense heat of the hot winds, than at any other time.
9th.—The Bāiza Bā’ī sent word she wished to see me ere her departure, as it was her intention to quit Allahabad and proceed to the west: a violent rheumatic headache prevented my being able to attend. The next morning she encamped at Padshah Bāgh, beyond Allahabad, on the Cawnpore road, where I saw her the next evening in a small round tent, entirely formed of tattīs. The day after she quitted the ground and went one march on the Cawnpore road, when the Kotwal of the city was sent out by the magistrate to bring her back to Allahabad, and she was forced to return. Her grand-daughter is very ill, exposed to the heat and rains in tents. I fear the poor girl’s life will be sacrificed. Surely she is treated cruelly and unjustly. She who once reigned in Gwalior has now no roof to shelter her: the rains have set in; she is forced to live in tents, and is kept here against her will,—a state prisoner, in fact.