"Its very high walls are ornamented externally with all the profusion of Eastern taste, but they are falling into ruins, as are also the mosques and houses inside the town. Time has laid its destructive hand upon this city, as upon Delhi and Agra. The ruins of Lahore are already as extensive as those of that ancient capital." Three days after his arrival the traveller was received with great politeness by Runjeet Sing, who conversed with him, principally upon military topics. The rajah was then twenty-seven years of age. His countenance would have been pleasant, had not the small-pox deprived him of one eye; his manners were simple, affable, and yet kingly. After paying visits to the tomb of Shah Jehan, to the Schalamar, and other monuments at Lahore, the officer returned to Delhi and the possessions of the Company. To his visit was due that better knowledge of the country which could not fail to tempt the ambition of the English Government. The following year (1809), an embassy, consisting of Messrs. Nicholas Hankey Smith, Henry Ellis, Robert Taylor, and Henry Pottinger, was sent to the Emirs of Scinde. The escort was commanded by Captain Charles Christie. The mission was transported to Keratchy by boat. The governor of that fort refused to allow the embassy to disembark, without instructions from the emirs. An interchange of correspondence ensued, as a result of which the envoy, Smith, drew attention to certain improprieties relating to the title and respective rank of the Governor-General and the emirs. The governor excused himself upon the ground of his ignorance of the Persian language, and said, that not wishing a cause of misunderstanding to exist, he was quite ready to kill or put out the eyes (as the envoy pleased) of the person who had written the letter. This declaration appeared sufficient to the English, who deprecated the execution of the guilty person. In their letters the emirs affected a tone of contemptuous superiority; at the same time they brought a body of 8000 men within reach, and put every possible difficulty in the way of the English efforts to procure information. After tedious negotiations, in the course of which British pride was humbled more than once, the embassy received permission to start for Hyderabad. Above Keratchy, which is the principal export harbour of Scinde, a vast plain without trees or vegetation extends along the coast. Five days are necessary to cross this, and reach Tatah, the ancient capital of Scinde, then ruined and deserted. Formerly it was brought into communication by means of canals, with the Sind, an immense river, which is, at its mouth, in reality an arm of the sea. Pottinger collected the most precise, complete, and useful details respecting the Sind, which were then known.