Therefore write, that they may read, of gratitude and of love and the
law. I myself, when I return, will show how the dish should be dressed
to take the taste here; for it is here that we must come. Cause to be
established in Jagesur a newspaper, and fill it with translations of
their papers. A beggar-taught may be brought from Calcutta for thirty
rupees a month, and if he writes in Gurmukhi our people cannot read.
Create, further, councils other than the panchayats of headmen, village
by village and district by district, instructing them beforehand what to
say according to the order of the Rao. Print all these things in a book
in English, and send it to this place, and to every man of the six
hundred. Bid the beggar-taught write in front of all that Jagesur
follows fast on the English plan. If thou squeezest the Hindu shrine at
Theegkot, and it is ripe, remit the head-tax, and perhaps the
marriage-tax, with great publicity. But above all things keep the troops
ready, and in good pay, even though we glean the stubble with the wheat
and stint the Rao Sahib’s women. All must go softly. Protest thou thy
love for the voice of the common people in all things, and affect to
despise the troops. That shall be taken for a witness in this land. The
headship of the troops must be mine. See that Bahadur Shah’s wits go
wandering over the wine, but do not send him to God. I am an old man,
but I may yet live to lead.
If this people be not bled out and regain strength, we, watching how the
tide runs, when we see that the shadow of their hand is all but lifted
from Hindustan, must bid the Bengali demand the removal of the residue
or set going an uneasiness to that end. We must have a care neither to
hurt the life of the Englishmen nor the honour of their women, for in
that case six times the six hundred here could not hold those who remain
from making the land swim. We must care that they are not mobbed by the
Bengalis, but honourably escorted, while the land is held down with the
threat of the sword if a hair of their heads fall. Thus we shall gain a
good name, and when rebellion is unaccompanied by bloodshed, as has
lately befallen in a far country, the English, disregarding honour, call
it by a new name: even one who has been a minister of the Empress, but
is now at war against the law, praises it openly before the common folk.
So greatly are they changed since the days of Nikhal Seyn![3] And then,
if all go well and the Sahibs, who through continual checking and
browbeating will have grown sick at heart, see themselves abandoned by
their kin—for this people have allowed their greatest to die on dry sand
through delay and fear of expense—we may go forward. This people are
swayed by names. A new name therefore must be given to the rule of
Hindustan (and that the Bengalis may settle among themselves), and there
will be many writings and oaths of love, such as the little island over
seas makes when it would fight more bitterly; and after that the residue
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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