Had your Lordship left the choice of a successor to me, I should have pointed out Colonel Outram; and I feel very much rejoiced that he has been selected for the office, and I hope he will come as soon as possible.  There are many honest men at Lucknow, and a finer peasantry no country can boast.  But no honest man can obtain or retain office under Government with the present minister and heads of departments.

But where the whole revenues of a fine country are available to suborn witnesses to prove the King to be a Solomon, no Resident would be able to find judicial proof of his being a fool; but that he is so I have had abundance of, to me, satisfactory evidence ever since I have been here.  It must soon, however, become clear, without the Resident’s efforts to make it so.  Where the Government of India is so solemnly pledged to see justice done to the people of a country, it cannot fairly permit them to be reigned over much longer by so incompetent a Sovereign.  Proofs enough of bad government and neglected duties were given in my Diary; and a picture more true was, I believe, never drawn of any country.  The duty of remedying the evils, and carrying out your Lordship’s views in Oude, whatever they may be, must now devolve on another.

No one of my present assistants knows anything whatever about Oude, its Government, or its people; and Colonel Outram will, therefore, labour under great disadvantages.  I hope, therefore, that your Lordship will pardon the liberty I take in suggesting that he be allowed the aid of Captain Weston.  He went over the whole of Oude with me, and knows almost all who have made themselves prominent for good or for evil within the last five years.  I know that, as soon as I go, some of the most atrocious villains whom I have kept out of office will try to purchase their way back; and there is no man too bad for the minister, provided he pays for his restoration.—­The murderer of the banker, mentioned in my Diary, vol. i., p. 131, and the murderer of thousands mentioned in the same volume.  Captain Weston is high minded, sagacious, energetic, hard-working, conciliatory and, to Colonel Outram, his services in the new charge would be invaluable.

I have the honour to remain,
Your Lordship’s faithful and obedient servant,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.

To the Most Noble
The Marquis of Dalhousie, K.T. 
Governor-General.

THE END.

     LONDON:  PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET.