February 3, 1850.—Poknapoor, eight miles. We crossed the Goomtee about midway, over a bridge of boats that had been prepared for us. The boats came up the river thus far for timber, and were detained for the occasion. The stream is here narrow, and said to flow from a basin (the phoola talao) in the Tarae forest, some fifty miles to the north, at Madhoo Tanda. There is some tillage on the verge of the stream on the other side; but from the river to our tents, four miles, there is none. The country is level and well studded with groves and fine single trees, bur, peepul, mhowa, mango, &c., but covered with rank grass.
Near the river is a belt of the sakhoo and other forest trees, with underwood, in which tigers lodge and prey upon the deer, which cover the grass plain, and frequently upon the bullocks, which are grazed upon it in great numbers. Several bullocks have been killed and eaten by them within the last few days; and an old fakeer, who has for some months taken up his lodging on this side the river under a peepul-tree, in a straw hut just big enough to hold him, told us that he frequently saw them come down to drink in the stream near his lodging. We saw a great many deer in passing, but no tigers. The soil near the river is sandy, and the ground uneven, but still cultivable; and on this side of the sandy belt it is all level and of the best kind of doomuteea. Our tents are in a fine grove of mango-trees, in the midst of a waste, but level and extensive, plain of this soil, not a rood of which is unfit for the plough or incapable of yielding crops of the finest quality. It is capable of being made, in two or three years, a beautiful garden.
The single trees, which are scattered all over it, have been shorn of their leaves and small branches by the cowherds for their cattle, but they would all soon clothe themselves again under protection. The groves are sufficiently numerous to furnish sites for the villages and hamlets required. All the large sakhoo-trees have been cut down and taken away on the ground we have come over, which is too near the river for them to be permitted to attain full size. Not an acre or a foot of the land is oosur, or unfit for tillage. Poknapoor is in the estate of Etowa, which forms part of the pergunnah of Peepareea, to which Bahadur Sing, the person above described, lays claim. He holds a few villages round his residence at Pursur; but the pergunnah is under the management of a Government officer, under the Amil of Mahomdee. The Rajah, Syud Ashruf Allee Khan, of Mahomdee, claims a kind of suzerainty over all the district, and over this pergunnah of Peepareea among the rest. From all the villages tilled and peopled he is permitted to levy an income for himself at the rate of two rupees a-village. This the people pay with some reluctance, though they recognise his right.
The zumeendars of Poknapoor are Kunojee Brahmins, who tell me that they can do almost everything in husbandry save holding their own ploughs: they can drive their own harrows and carts, reap their own crops, and winnow and tread out their own corn; but if they once condescend to hold their own ploughs they sink in grade, and have to pay twice as much as they now pay for wives for their sons from the same families, and take half of what they now take for their daughters from the same families, into which they now marry them. They have, they say, been settled in these pergunnahs, north-east of the Goomtee River, for fifty-two generations as farmers and cultivators; and their relatives, who still remain at Aslamabad, a village one koss south-east of Mahomdee, which was the first abode of the tribe in Oude, have been settled there for no less than eighty-four generations. They form village communities, dividing the lands among the several members, and paying over and above the Government demand a liberal allowance to the head of the village and of the family settled in it, to maintain his respectability and to cover the risk and cost of management, either in kind, in money, or in an extra share of the land.
The lands of Poknapoor are all divided into two equal shares, one held by Dewan and the other by Ramnath, who were both among the people with whom I conversed. Teekaram, who has a share in Dewan's half, mentioned that about thirteen years ago the Amil, Khwaja Mahmood, wanted to increase the rate of the Government demand on the village from the four hundred, which they had long paid, to four hundred and fifty; that they refused to pay, and Hindoo Sing, the Rajpoot tallookdar of Rehreea, one koss east of Poknapoor, offered to take the lease at four hundred and fifty, and got it. They refused to pay, and he, at the head of his gang of armed followers, attacked, plundered, and burnt down the village, and killed his, Teekaram's, brother Girdharee, with his two sons, and inflicted three severe cuts of a sabre on the right arm of his wife, who is now a widow among them. Hindoo Sing's object was to make this village a permanent addition to his estate; but, to his surprise, the Durbar took serious notice of the outrage, and he fled into the Shajehanpoor district, where he was seized by the magistrate, Mr. Buller, and made over to the Oude authorities for trial. He purchased his escape from them in the usual way; but soon after offered to surrender to the collector, Aboo Torab Khan, on condition of pardon for all past offences.
The collector begged the Brahmins to consent to pardon him for the murders, on condition of getting from Hindoo Sing some fifty beeghas of land, out of his share in Rehreea. They said they would not consent to take five times the quantity of the land among such a turbulent set; but should be glad to get a smaller quantity, rent-free, in their own village, for the widow of Girdharee. The collector gave them twenty-five beeghas, or ten acres, in Poknapoor; and this land Teekaram still holds, and out of the produce supports the poor widow. A razenamah, or pardon, was given by the family, and Hindoo Sing has ever since lived in peace upon his estate, The lease of the village was restored to the Brahmin family, at the reduced rate of two hundred and fifty, but soon after raised to four hundred, and again reduced to two hundred and fifty, after the devastation of Bahadur Sing and Bhoder Sing.
These industrious and unoffending Brahmins say that since these Rajpoot landholders came among them, many generations ago, there has never been any peace in the district, except during the time that Hakeem Mehndee held the contract, when the whole plain that now lies waste became a beautiful chummun (parterre); that since his removal, as before his appointment, all has been confusion; that the Rajpoot landholders are always quarrelling either among themselves or with the local Government authorities; and, whatever be the nature or the cause of quarrel, they always plunder and murder, indiscriminately, the unoffending communities of the villages around, in order to reduce these authorities to their terms; that when these Rajpoot landholders leave them in peace, the contractors seize the opportunity to increase the Government demand, and bring among them the King's troops, who plunder them just as much as the rebel landholders, though they do not often murder them in the same reckless manner. They told me that the hundreds of their relatives who had gone off during the disorders and taken lands, or found employment in our bordering districts, would be glad to return to their own lands, groves, and trees, in Oude, if they saw the slightest chance of protection, and the country would soon become again the beautiful parterre which Hakeem Mehndee left it thirty years ago, instead of the wilderness in which they were now so wretched; that they ventured to cultivate small patches here and there, not far from each other, but were obliged to raise small platforms, upon high poles, in every field, and sit upon them all night, calling out to each other, in a loud voice, to keep up their spirits, and frighten off the deer which swarmed upon the grass plain, and would destroy the whole of the crops in one night, if left unprotected; that they were obliged to collect large piles of wood around each platform, and keep them burning all night, to prevent the tigers from carrying off the men who sat upon them; that their lives were wretched amidst this continual dread of man and beast, but the soil and climate were good, and the trees and groves planted by their forefathers were still standing and dear to them; and they hoped, now that the Resident had come among them, to receive, at no distant day, the protection they required. This alone is required to render this the most beautiful portion of Oude, and Oude the most beautiful portion of India.
February 4, 1850.—Gokurnath, thirteen miles, north-east, over a level plain of the same fine muteear soil, here and there running into doomuteea and bhoor, but in no case into oosur. The first two miles over the grass plain, and the next four through a belt of forest trees, with rank grass and underwood, abounding in game of all kinds, and infested by tigers. Bullocks are often taken by them, but men seldom. The sal (alias sakhoo) trees are here stunted, gnarled, and ugly, while in the Tarae forest they are straight, lofty, and beautiful. The reason is, that beyond the forest their leaves are stripped off and sold for plates. They are carried to distant towns, and stored up for long periods, to form breakfast and dinner plates, and the people in the country use hardly anything else. Plates are formed of them by sewing them together, when required; and they become as pliable as leather, even after being kept for a year or more, by having a little water sprinkled over them. They are long, wide, and tough, and well suited to the purpose. All kinds of food are put upon them, and served up to the family and guests. The cattle do not eat them, as they do leaves of the peepul, bur, neem, &c. The sakhoo, when not preserved, is cut down, when young, for beams, rafters, &c., required in building. In the Tarae forest, the proprietors of the lands on which they stand preserve them till they attain maturity, for sale to the people of the plains; and they are taken down the Ghagra and other rivers that flow through the forest to the Ganges, and vast numbers are sold in the Calcutta market. The fine tall sakhoos in the Tarae forest are called "sayer"; the knotted, stunted, and crooked shakoos, beyond the forest, are called "khohurs." There are but few teak (or sagwun) trees in this part of the Tarae forest. The country is everywhere studded with the same fine groves and single trees, and requires only tillage to become a garden. From the belt of jungle to our camp at Gokurnath, seven miles, the road runs over an open grass plain, with here and there a field of corn. The sites of villages are numerous, but few of them are occupied at present. All are said to have been in a flourishing state, and filled by a happy peasantry, when Hakeem Mehndee lost the government. Since that time these villages and hamlets have diminished by degrees, in proportion as the rapacity of the contractors and the turbulence of the Rajpoot landholders have increased.
The first village we passed through, after emerging from the belt of jungle, was Pureylee, which is held and occupied by a large family of cultivating proprietors of the Koormee caste. Up to the year 1847, it had for many years been in a good condition, and paid a revenue of two thousand rupees a-year to Government. In that year Ahmud Allee, the collector, demanded a thousand more. They could not pay this, and he sold all their bullocks and other stock to make up the demand; the lands became waste as usual; and Lonee Sing, of Mitholee, offered the next contractor one thousand rupees a-year for the lease, and got it. The village has now been permanently absorbed in his estate, in the usual way; and, as the Koormees are a peaceful body, they have quietly acquiesced in the arrangement, and get all the aid they require from their new landlord. Before this time they had held their lands, as proprietors, directly under Government. From allodial* proprietors they are become feudal tenants under a powerful Rajpoot chief.
[* By allodial, I mean, lands held in proprietary right, immediately under the crown, but liable to the land-tax.]