From Sea to Sea; Letters of TravelKipling, Rudyard
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From Sea to Sea; Letters of Travel
Kipling, Rudyard
Asia -- Description and travel; Kipling, Rudyard, 1865-1936 -- Travel; United States -- Description and travel; Voyages and travels
Consequently, for the department takes a genuine interest in this form
of _shikar_, and the gaol leg-irons are not too light, dacoities have
been reduced to such an extent that men say "you may send a woman, with
her ornaments upon her, from Sojat to Phalodi, and she will not lose a
nose-ring." Again, and this in a Rajput State is an important matter,
the boundaries of nearly every village in Marwar have been demarcated,
and boundary fights, in which both sides preferred small-arm fire to the
regulation club, are unknown. The open-handed system of giving away
villages had raised a large and unmannerly crop of _jaghirdars_. These
have been taken up and brought in hand by Sir Pertab Singh, to the
better order of the State.
A Punjabi Sirdar, Har Dyal Singh, has reformed, or made rather, Courts
on the Civil and Criminal Side; and his hand is said to be found in a
good many sweepings out of old corners. It must always be borne in mind
that everything that has been done, was carried through over and under
unlimited intrigue, for Jodhpur is a Native State. Intrigue must be met
with intrigue by all except Gordons or demi-gods; and it is curious to
hear how a reduction in tariff, or a smoothing out of some tangled
Court, had to be worked by shift and byway. The tales are comic, but not
for publication. Howbeit, Har Dyal Singh got his training in part under
the Punjab Government, and in part in a little Native State far away in
the Himalayas, where intrigue is not altogether unknown. To the credit
of the "Pauper Province" be it said, it is not easy to circumvent a
Punjabi. The details of his work would be dry reading. The result of it
is good, and there is justice in Marwar, and order and firmness in its
administration.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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