Hakeem Mehndee exacted from the landholders of Bahraetch two annas in the rupee, or one-eighth, more than the rate they had hitherto paid; and his successor, Hadee Allee, exacted an increase of two annas in the rupee, upon the Hakeem's rate. It was difficult to make the landholders and cultivators pay this rate, and a good deal of their stock was sold off for arrears; and much land fell out of cultivation in consequence. To facilitate the collection of this exorbitant rate, and at the same time to reduce the cost of collection, he disregarded systematically the salutary rule of Saadut Allee Khan, who had died in 1814, and been succeeded by his do-nothing and see-nothing son, Ghazee-od Deen Hyder; and transferred the khalsa estates of all defaulters to the neighbouring tallookdars, who pledged themselves to liquidate the balances due, and pay the Government demand punctually in future. This arrangement enabled him to reduce his fiscal, military, and police establishments a good deal for the time, and his tenure of office was too insecure to admit of his bestowing much thought on the future. As soon as these tallookdars got possession of khalsa villages, they plundered them of all they could find of stock and other property; and, with all possible diligence, reduced to beggary all the holders and cultivators who had any claim to a right of property in the lands, in order to prevent their ever being again in a condition to urge such claims in the only way in which they can be successfully urged in Oude--cut down all the trees planted by them or their ancestors, and destroyed all the good houses they had built, that they might have no local ties to link their affections to the soil. As the local officers of the Oude government became weak, by the gradual withdrawal of British troops, from aiding in the collection of revenue and the suppression of rebellion and disorder, and by the deterioration in the character of the Oude troops raised to supply their places, the tallookdars became stronger and stronger. They withheld more and more of the revenue due to Government, and expended the money in building forts and strongholds, casting or purchasing cannon, and maintaining large armed bands of followers. All that they withheld from the public treasury was laid out in providing the means for resisting the officers of Government; and, in time, it became a point of honour to pay nothing to the sovereign without first fighting with his officers.