of making good the Government demand upon them; he has offered a higher rate of revenue for lands than present holders could make them yield, and, after getting possession, brought the demand down to a low rate in collusion with Government officers.  Some three-fourths of the magnificent estate which he now holds he has obtained in these and other ways by fraud, violence, or collusion within the last few years.  He is too powerful and wealthy to admit of any one’s getting his lands out of his hands after they have once passed into them, no matter how.

The Chowka river flows from the forest towards the Ghagra, about ten miles to the east from Biswa, and I am told that the richest sheet of cultivation in Oude is within the delta formed by these two rivers.* At the apex of this delta stands the fort of Bhitolee, which I have often mentioned as belonging to Rajah Goorbuksh Sing, and being under siege by the contractor of the Khyrabad district when we passed the Ghagra in December.  Biswa is a large town, well situated on a good soil and open plain, and its vicinity would be well suited for a cantonment or seat for civil establishments.  Much of the cloth called sullum used to be made here for export to Europe, but the demand has ceased, and with it the manufacture.

[* This delta contains the following noble estates; 1, Dhorehra; 2, Eesanuggur; 3, Chehlary; 4, Rampore; 5, Bhitolee; 6, Mullahpore; 7, Seonta; 8, Nigaseen; and 9, Bhera Jugdeopore.  The Turae forest forms the base of this delta, and the estates of Dhorehra, Eesanuggur, and Bhera Jugdeopore lie along its border.  They have been much injured by the King’s troops within the last three years.  Bhitolee is at the apex.]

February 17 and 18, 1850.—­Detained at Biswa by rain.

February 19, 1850.—­Yesterday evening came to Kaharpore, ten miles, over a plain of the same fine soil, mutteear of the best quality, running here and there into doomutteea and even bhoor.  Cultivation good, and the plain covered with rich spring crops, except where the ground is being prepared to receive the autumn seed in June next.  It is considered good husbandry to-plough, cross-plough, and prepare the lands thus early.  The spring crops are considered to be more promising than they have been at any other season for the last twenty years.  The farmers and cultivators calculate upon an average return of ten and twelve fold, and say that, in other parts of Oude where the lands are richer, there will be one of fifteen or twenty of wheat, gram, &c.  The pucka-beega, two thousand seven hundred and fifty-six square yards, requires one maund of seed of forty seers, of eighty rupees of the King’s and Company’s coinage the seer.* The country, as usual, studded with trees, single, and in clusters and groves, intermingled with bamboos, which are, however, for the most part, of the smaller or hill kind.