Some Sombunsies, who came out to pay their respects
from the next village we passed, told us, that they did not give
their daughters even to the Tilokchundee Bys Rajpoots; but in this
they did not tell the truth.
At the next village, the largest in the parish, Barone, the chief
landholder, Kewul Sing, came out and presented his offering of a fine
fighting-ram. He was armed with his bow, and "quiver full of arrows,"
but told me, that he thought a good gun, with pouch and flask, much
better, and he carried the bow and quiver merely because they were
lighter. He was surrounded by almost all the people of the town, and
told me, that the family held in copartnership fifty-two small
villages, immediately around _Barone_--that this village had been
attacked and burnt down by Captain Bunbury and his regiment the year
before last, without any other cause that they could understand save
that he had recommended him not to encamp in the grove close by. The
fact was, that none of the family would pay the Government demand, or
obey the old Amil, Hafiz Abdoollah; and it was necessary to make an
example. On being asked whether his family and clan, the Sombunsies,
preserved or destroyed their daughters, he told me, in the midst of
his village community, that he would not deceive me; that they, one
and all, destroyed their infant daughters; but that one was,
occasionally, allowed to live (_ek-adh_); that the family was under a
taint for twelve days after the murder of an infant, when the family
priest (Prohut) was invited and fed in due form; that he then
declared the absolution complete, and the taint removed.
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