10. Khojah Nasīr-ud-dīn of Tūs in Persia was a great astronomer, philosopher, and mathematician in the thirteenth century. The author's Imām-ud-dīn Ghazzālī is intended for Abū Hāmid Imām al Ghazzālī, one of the most famous of Musulmān doctors. He was born at Tūs, the modern Mashhad (Meshed) in Khurāsān, and died in A.D. 1111. His works are numerous. One is entitled The Ruin of Philosophies, and another, the most celebrated, is The Resuscitation of Religious Sciences (F. J. Arbuthnot, A Manual of Arabian History and Literature, London, 1890). These authors are again referred to in a subsequent chapter. I am not able to judge the propriety of Sleeman's enthusiastic praise.
11. The gentleman referred to was Mr. John Wilton, who was appointed to the service in 1775.
12. The cantonments at Dinapore (properly Dānāpur) are ten miles distant from the great city of Patna.
13. The rupee was worth more than two shillings in 1810. The remuneration of high officials by commission has been long abolished.
14. There used to be two opium agents, one at Patna, and the other at Ghāzīpur, who administered the Opium Department under the control of the Board of Revenue in Calcutta. In deference to the demands of the Chinese Government and of public opinion in England, the Agency at Ghāzīpur has been closed, and the Government of India is withdrawing gradually from the opium trade. Such lucrative sinecures as those described in the text have long ceased to exist.
15. These Persian words would not now be used in orders to servants.
16. This officer was Sir Joseph O'Halloran, K.C.B., attached to the 18th Regiment, N.I. He became a Lieutenant-Colonel on June 4, 1814, and Major-General on January 10, 1837. He is mentioned in Ramaseeana (p 59) as Brigadier-General commanding the Sāgar Division.
17. The King's demand was improper and illegal. The Muhammadan law, like the Jewish (Leviticus xviii, 18), prohibits a man from being married to two sisters at once. 'Ye are also forbidden to take to wife two sisters; except what is already past: for God is gracious and merciful' (Korān, chap. iv). Compare the ruling in 'Mishkāt-ul-Masābih', Book XIII, chap. v, Part II (Matthews, vol. ii, p. 94).
18. The colonel's son has succeeded to his father's estates, and he and his wife are, I believe, very happy together. [W. H. S.] Such an incident would, of course, be now inconceivable. The family name is also spelled Gardner. The romantic history of the Gardners is summarized in the appendix to A Particular Account of the European Military Adventures of Hindustan, from 1784 to 1803; compiled by Herbert Compton: London, 1892.
19. Ante, Chapter 53 text between [2] and [3].