Confessions of a Thug

by Meadows Taylor

Ay, you will tell him, thought I; but you must get there first, my friend. Mashalla! words are one thing, but deeds are another.

"And were they such fools?" I asked; "all the world say that Thugs are never to be taken in."

The fellow laughed scornfully. "Never taken in!" said he; "did not I deceive them? They are swine, they are asses; they murder poor travellers, but they have no wit, not so much as children. Their fool of a Jemadar tried to deceive me by wrapping his face in a cloth; but I saw him, dark as it was, and could swear to him among a thousand."

"What was he like?" inquired I; "I am curious to know, if it were only to avoid him in future, especially as I am a constant traveller on this road: but you said you attacked them?"

"Yes," said he; "I am an old traveller too, and as we were a large body, and the Thugs not more than treble our number, I said to my companions, that though I knew we were with Thugs, they ought not to fear, and if they would only watch me, we might attack and disperse them, and get their plunder: and by Alla! we did Sahib. Late at night we rose on them, killed some, and the rest ran away, among them the cowardly Jemadar. We got enough, too, to take us to Hyderabad comfortably."

So we had a narrow escape, thought I; these fellows would have attacked us, I doubt not, had we not gone on that night. But the lie, Sahib, was it not an impudent one? Yet I could not help laughing heartily at his relation, which he swore was true, by Alla and the Prophet, by my beard, and by every saint in his calendar.

We trudged on till we came in sight of two trees on the road, on which travellers hung bits of rag as offerings to the guardian saint of the place. I saw very plainly that this was their bhil; one by one they began to forsake their tattoos and collect. More delay on our part would have been fatal, and my father saw this. He was as prompt as I could have desired: he had seen their movements, and just as I had disengaged my roomal from my waist, he gave the jhirnee. Eleven of the Dacoos fell at the same moment; the leader by my hand. I had my roomal round his throat, and before I gave the fatal wrench, I shouted in his ear that I was Ameer Ali, the leader of the Thugs he had met, and that then I had sworn to kill him, and had done it. The rest were cut down with swords: my men were prepared, they were not, and were heavily encumbered. Yet had we delayed for another three or four hundred paces, they would have fallen upon us; and I think, Sahib, the Thugs would have run away. As it was, however, we were victorious; we threw the bodies as they were into the jungle, and pushed on, laughing heartily, and in the highest spirits at the issue of our adventure. The booty, too, was good—thirteen thousand rupees worth of gold, silver, and ready money met our admiring eyes, when the packages of the loaded tattoos were opened for our inspection.

Well, Sahib, we had proceeded as far as Sehora on our return, when we fell in with a great European, who was also travelling. We did not fear him, but on the contrary determined to keep with him, because we well knew that he had many travellers in his train who profited by the protection of his troops; so we divided into two parties, one under myself and my father, the other under Ganesha. Our object was to separate the travellers from him, and we hoped, by representing the inconvenience they were put to by delay on account of his slow marches, and the scarcity of provisions they would experience on the road, to induce them to accompany us. I need not follow the adventure further, for it differed not from the rest; suffice it to say, that after a few marches a large party of travellers had joined with us. We left the high-road to proceed by footpaths through the jungles, and near the village of Shirkarpoor we selected the bhil. The place was a favourite one, and well known to our party. The travellers fell, twenty-nine men, some women and children; all were buried in one grave, for the spot where they were killed was a desolate one. The deed was done in the night, but by the light of as fair a moon as ever shone on us. One child I saved from the general slaughter; Ganesha was not present to oppose me; and though the boy was a Hindoo, yet I determined to adopt him as my own, and to bring him up in the holy faith I professed myself, and this would enhance the merit of having spared him. But when his mother died, I could not force him away from the body; he clung to it, young as he was, with frantic force—he screamed and kicked whenever I attempted to lay hold of him, and bit me in the arms and the hands. I thought if the body was removed from his sight he would be quiet and submit to his fate; but no—when it was gone, he grew worse and worse; nothing would pacify or tranquillize him, and I fairly grew impatient and angry. I drew my sword, and threatened him but he was insensible to his danger; he reviled me, he spat at me with a child's virulence. I once more raised him up in my arms, but it was of no use; he seized my ear in his teeth and bit it till the blood came. In the agony of the pain and in my rage I knew not what I did. Sahib, how shall I tell you what followed! it was the worst act of my life but one, which I have yet to tell you of.

You killed him, I suppose, Ameer Ali, said I.

Yes, Sahib, I killed him; but oh, how did I do it! it was the devil's work, not mine. I never was cruel, but now the Shitan possessed me.