A tradition from Lucknow states that he was sent to England on a secret mission, 'to ask the Home authorities to accept a contract of Oudh direct from Nasir-ud-din Haidar, who was quite willing to remit the money of contract direct to England instead of settling the matter with the British Resident at Lucknow'. It is not clear what this exactly means. It may be that the King of Oudh, thinking that annexation was inevitable, may have been inclined to attempt to secure some private arrangement with the East India Company, under which he would remain titular sovereign, paying a tribute direct to the authorities in England, and that he wished to conduct these negotiations without the knowledge of the Resident at Lucknow. There does not seem to be independent evidence of this mission of Mir Hasan 'Ali, and we are told that it was, as might have been expected, unsuccessful. No mention is made of his wife in the official records, and I have been unable to trace her family name or the date and place of her marriage. Mir Hasan 'Ali and his wife sailed for Calcutta, and travelled to Lucknow via Patna. She tells little of her career in India, save that she lived there for twelve years, presumably from 1816 to 1828, and that eleven years of that time were spent in the house of her father-in-law at Lucknow. In the course of her book she gives only one date, September 18, 1825, when her husband held the post of Tahsildar, or sub-collector of revenue, at Kanauj in the British district of Farrukhabad. No records bearing on his career as a British official are forthcoming. Another Lucknow tradition states that on his arrival at the Court of Oudh from England he was, on the recommendation of the Resident, appointed to a post in the King's service on a salary of Rs. 300 per annum. Subsequently he fell into disgrace and was obliged to retire to Farrukhabad with the court eunuch, Nawab Mu'tamad-ud-daula, Agha Mir. With the restoration of Agha Mir to power, Hasan 'Ali returned to Lucknow, and was granted a life pension of Rs. 100 _per mensem_ for his services as Darogha at the Residency, and in consideration of his negotiations between the King and the British Government or the East India Company. From the information collected at Lucknow it appears that he was known as Mir Londoni, 'the London gentleman', and that he was appointed Safir, or Attaché, at the court of King Ghazi-ud-din Haidar, who conferred upon him the title of Maslaha-ud-daula, 'Counsellor of State'. By another account he held the post of Mir Munshi, head native clerk or secretary to the British Resident.