The people appeared to improve as we advanced farther into Bundêlkhand in appearance, manners, and intelligence. There is a bold bearing about the Bundêlas, which at first one is apt to take for rudeness or impudence, but which in time he finds not to be so. The employés of the Râjâ were everywhere attentive, frank, and polite; and the peasantry seemed no longer inferior to those of our Sâgar and Nerbudda territories. The females of almost all the villages through which we passed came out with their _Kalas_ in procession to meet us--one of the most affecting marks of respect from the peasantry for their superiors that I know. One woman carries on her head a brass jug, brightly polished, full of water; while all the other families of the village crowd around her, and sing in chorus some rural song, that lasts from the time the respected visitor comes in sight till he disappears. He usually puts into the Kalas a rupee to purchase 'gur' (coarse sugar), of which all the females partake, as a sacred offering to the sex. No member of the other sex presumes to partake of it, and during the chorus all the men stand aloof in respectful silence. This custom prevails all over India, or over all parts of it that I have seen; and yet I have witnessed a Governor-General of India, with all his suite, passing by this interesting group, without knowing or asking what it was. I lingered behind, and quietly put my silver into the jug, as if from the Governor-General.[20] The man who administers the government over these seven villages in all its branches, civil, criminal, and fiscal, receives a salary of only two hundred rupees a year. He collects the revenues on the part of Government; and, with the assistance of the heads and the elders of the villages, adjusts all petty matters of dispute among the people, both civil and criminal. Disputes of a more serious character are sent to be adjusted at the capital by the Râjâ and his ministers. The person who reigns over the seven villages of the lake is about thirty years of age, of the Râjpût caste, and, I think, one of the finest young men I have ever seen. His ancestors have served the Orchhâ State in the same station for seven generations; and he tells me that he hopes his posterity will serve them [_sic_] for as many more, provided they do not forfeit their claims to do so by their infidelity or incapacity. This young man seemed to have the respect and affection of every member of the little communities of the villages through which we passed, and it was evident that he deserved their attachment. I have rarely seen any similar signs of attachment to one of our own native officers. This arises chiefly from the circumstance of their being less frequently placed in authority among those upon whose good feelings and opinions their welfare and comfort, as those of their children, are likely permanently to depend. In India, under native rule, office became hereditary,