I think I told you of the raw the minister, Wasee Alee and Co., had established on the King’s mind—­the belief that a party of the members of the royal family and native gentlemen at Lucknow had been trying to persuade Government to set him aside, and put his reputed brother, Mostafa Alee, on the throne.  Whenever they want to make the King angry with any one, they tell him that he is a leader in this cabal.  But the King is, by degrees, growing out of this folly.  There never was on the throne, I believe, a man more inoffensive at heart than he is; and he is quite sensible of my anxious desire to advise him rightly, and see justice done in all cases.  But I am a sad stumbling-block to the minister and the other bad and incompetent officers employed in the administration.

If you wish it, I will be more circumstantial about Weston’s locum tenens, Lieut.  B., of the 1st Cavalry.  For his own repute, and that of the Government, I think the less he has to do with the political department the better.  He would be better in a military staff appointment than a political one.

Yours sincerely,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.

To the Hon. Colonel Low, C.B.

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Lucknow, 11th September, 1854.

My Lord,

The post which this morning brought me your Lordship’s letter of the 6th instant brought me also one from Bombay, which I enclose for your Lordship’s perusal.  Should you think it worth while, Colonel Outram will be able to sift the matter to which it refers.  I have long been aware of the intrigue, and have taken care to let the King know that I am so; but as I knew, at the same time, that the object was merely to get money out of him, and to strengthen his confidence in his minister, which had begun to give way, I did not think it necessary to trouble your Lordship with any reference on the subject.  I knew that letters had been forged as from the King of Persia to the King of Oude, proposing to divide Hindoostan between them, and I thought it to be my duty to tell him so, in order to warn him; but, as he denied ever having received such letters, I told him that I should take the word of a King, and say no more about it.  He is certainly not of sound mind, and things must, ere long, come to a crisis.  His mind may have been of an average kind when he was young, but it has long become emasculated by over-indulgence; and the minister and his minions can make him believe or do what they please.  They know that it cannot last long, and they have agents in Bombay and Calcutta to assist them in fleecing the King of money on all manner of false pretences.

The minister, a consummate knave, and one of the most incompetent men of business that I have ever known, has all the revenues and patronage of the country to distribute among those who have access to the King exclusively—­they are poets, fiddlers, eunuchs, and profligate women; and every one of them holds, directly or indirectly, some court or other, fiscal, criminal, or civil, through which to fleece the people.  Anything so detestable as the Government I have nowhere witnessed, and a man less competent to govern them than the King I have never known.