"Even the force you have must be that, Uncle."
"Not so much as you would think, Dick, with your English notions. The pay here is very small--so small that it would seem to you impossible for a man to live on it; and yet, many of these men have wives and families. All of them have patches of land that they cultivate; only twenty, who are changed once a month, being kept on duty. They are necessary; for I should have but little respect from my people, and less still from other rajahs, did I not have sentries at the gates, and a guard ready to turn out in honour of any visitor who might arrive; to say nothing of an escort, of half a dozen men, when I ride through the country. Of course, all can be called out whenever I want them, as, for example, when I rode to Madras to meet you. The men think themselves well off upon the pay of three rupees a month, as they are practically only on duty two months each year, and have the rest of the time to cultivate their fields. Therefore, with the pay of the officers, my troop only costs me about four hundred rupees a month, which is, you know, equivalent to forty English pounds; so that you cannot call it an expensive army, even if it is kept for show rather than use."
"No, indeed, Uncle! It seems ridiculous that a troop of a hundred men can be kept up, for five hundred pounds a year."
"Of course, the men have some little privileges, Dick. They pay no rent or taxes for their lands. This is a great thing for them, and really costs me nothing, as there is so much land lying uncultivated. Then, when too old for service, they have a pension of two rupees a month for life, and on that, and what little land they can cultivate, they are comparatively comfortable."
"Well, it does not seem to me, Uncle, that soldiering is a good trade in this country."
"I don't know that it is a good trade, in the money way, anywhere. After all, the pay out here is quite as high, in comparison with the ordinary rate of earning of a peasant, as it is in England. It is never the pay that tempts soldiers. Among young men there are always great numbers who prefer the life to that of a peasant, working steadily from daylight to dark, and I don't know that I altogether blame them."
"Then you think, Uncle, there is no doubt whatever that there will be war?"
"Not a shadow of doubt, Dick--indeed, it may be said to have begun already; and, like the last, it is largely due to the incapacity of the government of Madras."
"I have just received a message from Arcot," the Rajah said, two months later, "and I must go over and see the Nabob."
"I thought," Mrs. Holland said, "that Tripataly was no longer subject to him. I understood that our father was made independent of Arcot?"