J. F. Campbell Collection > Mathurá

20 P AEG AN A CnnATA.
of the old Buchlial clan agreed to become Miihammadans and moved to an out-
lying spot where they formed an independent settlement. Like most Malakanas,
•svlio have been converted in this summary manner, though they have ceased
to be Hindus, they have never been taught even the rudiments of their new
faith, and are thus virtually without any moral restraint whatever ; while their
social isolation has had such a deadening effect upon their mental faculties that in
intelligence or acquired information they soarcely rank one step above the level of
the brute creation. Probably the best of landlords would find them a trouble3om3
and uninteresting set to deal with, however considerate his treatment of them ;
certainly no improvement can result from the procedure adopted by their
present lord. To prevent the possibility of any individual acquiring a fixed
status, leases are never given but for very short periods ; at the outset an
advance is freely made to the new tenant, at an usurious rate of interest anl
without any official record of fchs transaction ; accuiialation of arrears of rent
is encouraged for the three years that the law allows, when immediate action is
taken for the recovery of the full amount increased by interest; if any piy-
nient has been made in the interim, though the tenant intended it to be oi
account of rent, the landlord maintains that it is absorbei in the clearing o!f
of the advances; no intimation is given to the patwari of the amount of thes?
advances, nor, as a rule, is any payment made in his presence ; but after th ;
lapse of some weeks, when the ignorant boor, who probably did not pay in cash,
but through the intervention of a baniya, has forgottou what the amount wa-',
the patwari is ordered to write a receipt for such and such a sum, and this
document is accepted by the stolid clown without a question — ordinarily
without even hearing it read— and is at once put away and either lost or eaten
by white ants ; while the counter-part remains as legal evidence against him.
To increase the confusion, the rent is collected not only wdthout adequate wit-
nesses or any written memorandum, but also at any odd time and by a variety
of different persons, who are ignorant of each others' proceedings ; the agenls
are changed every six months or so, and (as the patwari can only read Hindi,)
are by preference people who know only the Persian character. The result is,
that any adjustment of accounts is absolutely impossible ; the patwari, the
agents, and the tenants, are all equally at fault, and the latter are solely depend-
ent on the mercy of the landlord, who at a fortnight's notice can eject every
single man on the estate. Tims, during one month of the current year moi-o
than a hundred suits were filed against the people of Naugdma for arrears con-
tracted in 1870. After the lapse of three yoai*s, the defendants — who are so igno-
rant that they cannot state the amount of their liability for the present season,
but depend entirely upon the patwari and the baniya — can only urge that the 9"
know they have paid in full, but (almost necessarily under the circumstances)
tl;ey hare no oral witnesses to the fact, while the village account-books, which