terminating in large pearls, which mixed with and hung as low as her hair, which was curled on each side her head in long ringlets, like Charles the Second’s beauties.  On her forehead she wore a small gold circlet, from which depended and hung, half way down, large pearls interspersed with emeralds.  Above this was a paradise plume, from which strings of pearls were carried over the head, as we turn our hair.  Her earrings were immense gold rings, with pearls and emeralds suspended all round in large strings, the pearls increasing in size.  She had a nose ring also with large round pearls and emeralds; and her necklaces, &c., were too numerous to be described.  She wore long sleeves, open at the elbow; and her dress was a full petticoat with a tight body attached, and open only at the throat.  She had several persons to bear her train when she walked; and her women stood behind her couch to arrange her head-dress, when, in moving, her pearls got entangled in the immense robe of scarlet and gold she had thrown around her.  This beautiful creature is the envy of all the other wives, and the favourite at present of both the King and his mother, both of whom have given her titles—­See Mrs. Park’s Wandering, vol. i., page 87.  Taj Mahal still lives and enjoys a pension of six thousand rupees a-month, under the guarantee of the British Government.  She became very profligate after the King’s death; and after she had given birth to one child, it was deemed necessary to place a guard over her to prevent her dishonouring the memory of the King, her husband, any further by giving birth to more.”

Of Miss Walters, alias Mokuddera Ouleea, the same lady writes:—­“The other newly-made Queen is nearly European, but not a whit fairer than Taj Mahal.  She is, in my opinion, plain; but she is considered by the native ladies very handsome, and she was the King’s favourite before he saw Taj Mahal.  She was more splendidly dressed than even Taj Mahal.  Her head-dress was a coronet of diamonds, with a fine crescent and plume of the same.  She is the daughter of a European merchant, and is accomplished for an inhabitant of a zunana, as she writes and speaks Persian fluently, as well as Hindoostanee; and it is said that she is teaching the King English, though when we spoke to her in English, she said she had forgotten it, and could not reply.  She was, I fancy, afraid of the Queen Dowager, as she evidently understood us; and when asked if she liked being in the zunana, she shook her head and looked quite melancholy.  Jealousy of the new favourite, however, appeared to be the cause of her discontent, as, though they sat on the same couch, they never addressed each other.”

Of Mulika Zumanee, the same lady says:—­“The mother of the King’s children, Mulika Zumanee, did not visit us at the Queen Dowager’s; but we went to see her at her own palace.  She is, after all, the person of the most political consequence, being the mother of the heir-apparent; and she has great power over her royal husband, whose ears she boxes occasionally.”