He was then led up to the scaffold, the most
primitive affair that I ever beheld. It was
only a piece of woodwork resembling a large
crock or crate in which a dinner-service is
packed for exportation. Upon this crock,
which was placed under the beam, he was
requested to stand. Having obeyed this
order, the rope was adjusted around his neck.
The assistant magistrate then called out to
him, in Hindostanee, " Have you anything to
say?"

"Yes, Sahib," was the reply. And he
began a long story—false from beginning to
end; but every word of which the Bengalee
writer took down. He spoke, and with
vehemence, for about thirty-five minutes,
when, having stopped—either finally or to
take breath— the assistant magistrate gave
the signal to the gaoler, by waving his hand.
The crock was then pulled from under the
culprit by the two policemen, and down
dangled the culprit's body, the feet not more
than eighteen inches from the ground.

They are not adepts in the art of hanging
in India; it took the culprit at least ten
minutes to die. At times I feared — so
desperate were his struggles — that he would
break the beam, snap the rope, or bring down
the whole apparatus. In the days of Henry
Fielding, the vulgar used to speak of hanging
as " dancing on nothing; " and this horrible
idea the Indian culprit, on that morning,
amply realised. The reader must not, however,
sympathise with his sufferings. He had
been justly convicted and was justly put to
death for murdering, in that very field where
he expiated his offence, a little girl of
seven years of age, in order to possess himself
of a silver bangle she wore— a bangle
valued at one rupee four annas (half-a-crown
of English money). I cannot accuse myself
of a cruel or brutal disposition; but, if the
monster whom I saw hanged had had a
thousand lives instead of one, I could have
witnessed the taking of every one of them
without a single atom of a desire to save
him.

The cutting down of the culprit, as soon as
it was discovered that life was extinct (for as
there was no crowd of pickpockets and vendors
of cakes and gingerbeer to take a moral
lesson, the prescribed hour was unnecessary),
was quite as primitive as the foregoing part
of the operation. One of the native policemen,
with his blunt sword, severed the rope
by sawing it just above the tie, and down
came the corpse. I was tempted to jump
out of the buggy—in which, sitting between
the magistrate and his assistant I had witnessed
the execution— and examine, or rather
look attentively at, the deceased. A finer
head, in a phrenological point of view, I had
never seen; and across the naked chest was
suspended the sacred thread, indicating that
the culprit was a Brahmin.

"Is it not very odd," said I, on my return
to the buggy, " that most of the diabolical
crimes committed in this country are
committed by Brahmins ?"

"Not at all odd," replied my host. "Do
you not know that they believe nothing can
hurt their pure souls after death; and hence
their comparative recklessness in this world?
There was a Brahmin hanged here, about a
year ago, who, just before he was turned off,
made a speech such as that made by Napoleon,
on paper, to Sir Hudson Lowe: 'You
may convict me of what you please; you
may make me a prisoner; you may, if you
like, shackle these limbs, and consign me to
a dungeon; but you will find that my soul
will be just as free, and just as proud, as
when it awed all Europe! '"

"Ah, but that was the emanation of—- "

"What the deuce is that? " cried the
magistrate, who was driving us rapidly
towards home. " See! That thing in the
road? " and coming up to it, he reined in the
horse.

The syce (groom), who was running behind
the buggy, picked up the object, at his
master's bidding. It was a cloak—a lady's
cloak—made of most costly materials, — satin
and silk, and wadded throughout. It had
evidently fallen, unobserved, from some palanquin
during the night; and, an examination
of the foot-prints showed that the last
traveller who had moved along the road was
journeying upward, and was then, most
probably, staying at the dak bungalow at
Deobund, a halting-place some twelve miles
distant. The assistant magistrate, after we
had breakfasted, proposed that he and I
should drive to Deobund, and make inquiries.
I was nothing loth; and a swift mare having
been harnessed and put to the buggy, off we
started, two sowars (native horsemen or
mounted police) cantering behind us.

About two miles from the bungalow to
which we were proceeding, we overtook a
tribe of large monkeys. I should say there
were as many as four hundred; and each
carried a stick of uniform length and shape.
They moved along in ranks or companies,
just, in short, as though they were imitating
a wing of a regiment of infantry. At the
head of this tribe was an old and very powerful
monkey, who was no doubt the chief. It
was a very odd sight, and I became greatly
interested in the movements of the creatures.
There could be no question that they had
either some business or some pleasure on
hand: and the fact of each carrying a stick
led us to conclude that it was the former
upon which they were bent. Their destination
was, like ours, evidently Deobund, where
there are some hundreds of monkeys fed by a
number of Brahmins, who live near a Hindoo
temple there, and perform religious ceremonies.
They (this monkey regiment) would
not get out of the road on our account, nor
disturb themselves in any way; and my
friend was afraid to drive through their
ranks, or over any of them, for when assailed