[13]
These classes have never learnt anything, or considered anything
worth learning, but the use of the sword; and a Rajput chief, next to
leading a gang of his own on great enterprises, delights in nothing
so much as having a gang or two under his patronage for little ones.
There is hardly a single chief of the Hindoo military class in the
Bundelkhand or Gwalior territories, who does not keep a gang of
robbers of some kind or other, and consider it as a very valuable and
legitimate source of revenue; or who would not embrace with
cordiality the leader of a gang of assassins by profession who should
bring him home from every expedition a good horse, a good sword, or a
valuable pair of shawls, taken from their victims. It is much the
same in the kingdom of Oudh, where the lands are for the most part
held by the same Hindoo military classes, who are in a continual
state of war with each other, or with the Government authorities.
Three-fourths of the recruits for native infantry regiments are from
this class of military agriculturists of Oudh, who have been trained
up in this school of contest; and many of the lads, when they enter
our ranks, are found to have marks of the cold steel upon their
persons.
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