Officers commanding regiments and companies complain that the sipahees and native officers never get redress, whatever trouble they take to obtain it for them; and, I believe, they hardly ever hear a sipahee or native officer acknowledge that he has had redress.  A sipahee one day came to the first Assistant, Captain Shakespear, clamouring for justice, and declared that not the slightest notice had been taken of his petition by the Oude Government or its local authorities.  On being questioned, he admitted that no less than forty persons had been seized and were in prison on his requisition; but he would not admit that this was any proof of the slightest notice having been taken of his complaint.  All are worried, and but few benefited by the privilege, and the advantage of it to the army never can counterbalance all the disadvantages.  Invalid pensioners do not now enjoy the privilege, but are left to prefer their claims direct to the King’s Courts, like others of the King’s subjects, on the ground that they cannot—­like sipahees still serving—­plead distance from their homes; but a large proportion of the sipahees still serving who have, or pretend to have, claims, obtain leave of absence from their regiments to prosecute them in person.

The objection once raised by Lord William Bentinck against our employing troops in support of the Government of Oude against refractory landholders, is equally valid against our advocacy of the claims of sipahees to lands.  “If,” said his Lordship, “British troops be lent to enforce submission, it seems impossible to avoid becoming parties to the terms of submission and guarantees of their observance afterwards on both sides; in which case we should become mixed up in every detail of the administration.”  If the sipahee does not pay punctually the assessment upon the lands which he has obtained through the Resident, the Oude Government calls upon the Resident to enforce payment; and if the Oude Government ventures to add a rupee to the rate demanded for the year, or for any one year, the sipahee, through the commandant of his corps, and, perhaps, the Commander-in-Chief and Governor-General, calls upon the Resident to have the rate reduced, or to explain the grounds upon which it has been made; or if the sipahee has a dispute with his numerous co-sharers, the Resident is called upon to settle it.  If the King’s troops have trespassed, if the crops have suffered from calamities of season or marauders, or the village has been robbed, the sipahee refuses to pay, and demands a remission of the Government demand; and if he does not get it, appeals in the same manner to the Resident.  If a sipahee be arrested or detained for defalcation, a demand comes for his immediate release; and if his crops or stock be distrained for balance, or lands attached, the Resident is called upon to ascertain and explain the reason why, and obtain redress.  All such distraint is represented as open robbery and pillage.