Commission appointed in 1837 to consider means for the suppression of Dacoity—Story of a daring attack upon government—Disguises assumed by Dacoits—The Brinjaras—The “Byragee” or religious devotee—Professional poisoners and highway robbers—The datura—Its action and employment—Hereditary descendants of Thugs—Predatory tribes of criminal instinct—Some noted Dacoits—Female leaders—Theft of government treasure in a British garrison—A Dacoit’s revenge.

It has been asserted that although Thuggee has been ostensibly stamped out in India, road murders are still committed in considerable numbers by the agency of poison administered to travellers, and that this is the work of Bhowanee’s votaries carrying on the old business, still impelled by their horrible religion. This impression is believed to be erroneous. There is no evidence that the gang-robbers who undoubtedly use poison such as opium, arsenic, datura and other drugs to stupefy or kill their victims, belong to the fell organisation so long a scourge in Indian society; or that the worship of Bhowanee, observed with such murderous rites, still exists in India. Nevertheless, the administration of poison by professional robbers, who infested the main roads and lurked in the vicinity of large towns, was largely and for the most part mysteriously practised until a comparatively recent date, if it is not indeed still prevalent. It was one of the forms of Dacoity, a crime akin to Thuggee, but without its religious pretensions, and ever one of the most serious evils combated by the British government. This widespread plague throve and prospered by reason of the fierceness and audacity of certain classes and the timidity and submissiveness characteristic of others. “In Bengal proper,” says Sir Richard Temple, “it was a crime with an extensive organisation, having professional ringleaders followed by gangs of enrolled men.” It was repressed and to a great extent broken up by the strong administrative machinery of the British government, but the crime still crops up in a milder form and is “one of the earliest symptoms of impending scarcity, political excitement or any social trouble.”

We may pause to examine some of the earlier records of Dacoity. A commission to consider its suppression was instituted in India in the year 1837. Hitherto but little had been ascertained of the character or methods employed by this class of criminal. Although Dacoities were every day committed and reported by the magistrates, it was thought that these gangs resided for the most part between the Ganges and Jumna rivers and in the kingdom of Oude, but information regarding their habits and location was vague and uncertain. Everyone talked of Budhuk Dacoits and their daring robberies, but no one knew who or what they were, whence they came or how their system was organised. In the course of this inquiry, the magistrate of the Gorruckpore district, which borders on the kingdom of Oude, informed the government that the Dacoits were not inhabitants of any part of the British territories but organised banditti from Oude, and that to deal effectively with this crime was altogether beyond the power of the magistrates of the district and the local police. He instanced in proof of the strength and daring of the Dacoits the details of an attack made upon a party of government treasure-bearers in 1822. This story was related long afterward to an English official by one of the Dacoits concerned in the affair and is given in his own words as follows:

“About eighteen years ago Lutee Jemadar sent a messenger to me to say that he should like to join me in an expedition, and I went to him with Jugdeum and Toke to settle preliminaries. The first day was spent in feasting and nothing was settled about business. On the following day he told me that remittances of government treasure went every month from Peprole to Gorruckpore, and if we were prudent we might get some of it. It had, however, become known that an escort of troopers and foot-soldiers always accompanied these remittances and unless the attack was in the nature of a surprise some casualties were likely to occur. After exploring the ground, it was seen that the way passed through an extensive jungle, so thick that horsemen could not safely leave the high road.” A point in this jungle was selected for the attack and to facilitate it strong ropes were fastened across the road ahead, while other ropes were in readiness to block it behind so soon as treasure and escort had passed through. A gang of forty was collected for the robbery, ten matchlock-men, ten swordsmen and twenty-five spearmen, who proceeded to lie in ambush awaiting news of the approach of their prey. On the third morning it was near at hand, the ropes ahead were fixed and a number of men posted, armed with matchlocks loaded with shot, as the Dacoits did not desire to take life. As soon as the trap was laid and the time of retreat intercepted, fire was opened from all sides. The escort was thrown into confusion, the foot soldiers sought refuge in the bush, the horsemen tried to escape by jumping over the ropes, while the thieves broke in upon the treasure and took possession of some 12,000 rupees.

Daring attacks of this kind by gangs drawn from this great family of professional and hereditary robbers were frequent in all parts of India. No district between the Berhampootra, the Nurbudda, the Sutlej and the Himalayas was free from them, and no merchant or manufacturer could feel himself secure for a single night from the depredations of Budhuk Dacoits. In 1822, in the district of Nursingpoor in the Nurbudda valley, in the dusk of evening, a party of about thirty persons, apparently armed with nothing but walking sticks in their hands, passed the picket of Sepahees, who stood with a native commissioned officer on the bank of a rivulet separating the cantonments from the town of Nursingpoor. On being challenged by the sentries, they said they were cowherds who had been out with their cattle which were following close behind. They walked up the street, and having arrived in front of the houses of the most wealthy merchants, they set their torches in a blaze by a sudden blow upon the pots containing combustibles; everybody who ventured to move or to make the slightest noise was stabbed; the houses were plundered, and in ten minutes more the assailants fled with their booty, leaving about twelve persons dead and wounded on the ground. A magistrate close at hand despatched large parties of foot and horse police in all directions, but no one was seized nor was it discovered whence the gang had come, or any particulars as to their identities. This occurred in the month of February, when marriage processions take place every day in all large towns; the nights are long, and much money is circulated in the purchase of cotton in all cotton districts like that of Nursingpoor. There was a large police guard within twenty paces of the Dacoity on one side, and this picket of Sepahees within a hundred paces on the other. Both saw the blaze of the torches and heard the noise, but both mistook it for a marriage procession, and the first intimation given of the real character of the party was by a little boy, who had crept along a ditch unobserved by the Dacoits, and half dead with fright, whispered to the officer commanding them that they were robbers and had killed his father. Before the officer could get his men ready, all were gone and nothing more was heard of them until twenty years later, when the perpetrators of the attack were detected and brought to justice.

The Dacoits sometimes assumed disguises to hide the real nature of their business. In 1818 a notorious leader named Maheran with a gang of fifty Budhuks, set out from Khyradee in the Oude Terai under the disguise of bird catchers. They had with them falcons, hawks of all kinds, well-trained, also mynas, parrots and other varieties of speaking and mocking birds. At Bareilly, in Oude, they were joined by another small gang, and all proceeded in pursuit of some treasure on its way from Benares westward, carried by ponies under charge of twenty-four burkundazes, “native watchmen,” and policemen. They determined to attack the treasure party at their halting place between Allahabad and Cawnpore. A boat had been purchased to keep along the bank of the river, ready to help the party across after the attack, and by this the women and children were all landed on the Oude side of the river opposite the Serai. Maheran with two or three selected men in disguise remained with the treasure until they saw it safely lodged for the night, when he returned to his gang to make arrangements for the attack. Ladders, torches and handles for the spear-heads and axes had been provided in the usual way, and two hours after dark they scaled the wall of the Serai. Meanwhile confederates within broke open the gate from the inside and stood over it to prevent interruption, while the rest attacked the escort and secured the treasure. They killed six persons of the guards, wounded seventeen and secured 70,000 rupees.

Maheran was captured in a later expedition and hanged, but his widow Moneea took his place as leader of the gang and shortly afterward fitted out another expedition to Junnukpoor in the Nepal territory several hundred miles to the east of their bivouac, to intercept some treasure on its way to the capital, Khatmandu. This expedition consisted of eighty chosen men and seven women. After taking the auspices they set out in small parties toward the appointed place of rendezvous. On the way, one of the parties, under a leader named Johuree, fell in with fifteen bullocks laden with treasure under the charge of eighty Gorkhas. The Dacoits, being in disguise, managed to join the escort without exciting suspicion and ascertained that they were carrying a treasure to the value of 64,000 rupees from the collector’s treasury in the plain to the capital. Johuree ordered two of his men to continue with the escort and went on himself with the rest to join the other leaders at the appointed place and to consult with them. He found that only a part of the gang had arrived and these thought it wiser to postpone an attack until the rest came up, saying, “If we succeed in taking the treasure, many of our friends must be seized on suspicion and beaten into confessions that may lead to the ruin of all, whereas if we forbear this time we shall be all collected before the next monthly remittance goes up, and we may secure it with little hazard to our friends or to ourselves.”

Johuree urged that one bird in the hand was worth two in the bush and at length prevailed upon the others to accept his counsel. They mustered fifty men and prepared to follow the treasure. The two scouts continued with the treasure escort in the disguise of pilgrims, and when they had seen it safely lodged at a spot under the first range of hills and had carefully reconnoitred the position, one of them hastened to Johuree with his report. All now set out and reached the village of Bughalee in the evening. From this place Johuree went forward to reconnoitre and found the treasure lodged in a fortified place with a wall and ditch all around it. A party of four or five hundred traders who carried goods from the plains to the hills were encamped on the edge of the ditch. After carefully surveying the position, Johuree returned to his friends and ordered that a couple of stout ladders twenty feet long should be made out of wood cut in the forest. Advancing in silence, they placed these ladders and got over the ditch and wall close to where the treasure lay. It was about midnight, with a good moon and clear sky, but still they thought it necessary to light their torches, and under the blaze they commenced the attack. The escort was taken by surprise and made but a feeble resistance. The gang took the whole amount of 64,000 rupees and effected their retreat without losing a man. On reaching a retired spot two or three miles from the scene of action, they divided the spoil, but every man had too much to admit of rapid travelling, so 17,000 rupees were buried at this place, and with the remaining 47,000 rupees the party moved on through the forest. As soon as news of the loss of the treasure reached the Nepal cantonments at Jalesar, whence it had been despatched, every suspicious person that could be found was seized. Two regiments then stationed at Jalesar were despatched through the forest to the westward to intercept the robbers, and fell in with some of Johuree’s party, from whom they recovered a portion of the treasure, while Johuree got safely home with the rest.

The precision with which veterans remembered and described Dacoities at which they had assisted during their lives was often wonderful. One of the leaders of the Oude Terai gangs named Lucke, when arrested, described forty-nine Dacoities at which he had been present during his career of twenty-five years. The local authorities to whom his narratives were sent endorsed his account of forty-one as having been perpetrated precisely as he described them, though many of them had taken place near Calcutta, some four or five hundred miles from the bivouac in Oude forest from which the gang had set out.

Reference has been made to the disguises assumed by the Dacoits. The most suitable to the locality in which they were about to work were as a rule selected. Thus, north of the Jumna they became carriers of Ganges, or holy water, because men of that class were continually to be met with on those roads. South of the Jumna they pretended to be pilgrims journeying to some sacred shrine, or relatives sadly conveying the bones of the departed to the banks of the Ganges, or the friends of a bridegroom sent to fetch and bring home his bride. The rÔle of funeral mourners was very popular because out of respect for their sorrowful business they were treated with much deference and subjected to no inconvenient inquiries as to whence they came or whither they were going. The bones they carried were commonly those of inferior animals, wild or domestic; they were kept in bags,—red for male bones, white for female,—and at their halting places these bags were suspended from the apex of a triangle formed by three stout poles, to be used later as the handles for the spear-heads concealed in their waistbands. Another favourite disguise was that of the Brinjaras, the traditional carriers of grain and salt, who travel long distances conveying the grain to the sea coast and returning with the salt. These Brinjaras were a peculiar and distinct race, who were much employed by the Duke of Wellington (when Sir Arthur Wellesley) as food-carriers in his Indian campaigns. Their appearance was distinctive and their costume peculiar; of intelligent countenance and strongly knit, wiry frames, they dressed—the women especially—in fantastic parti-coloured clothes; the women’s arms were completely encased from shoulder to wrist in bracelets of bone or ivory; they wore coins round their necks and curiously interwoven in their hair, which gave a strange, flighty, wild air to their always expressive and sometimes good-looking faces. The Brinjaras strictly adhered to certain customs; they did not intermarry, and lived in no fixed abode, although they halted often in the same encampment for some time; they observed the stars and scrupulously followed omens; they spoke the languages of most of the places they visited, but had a peculiar dialect of their own. They had no defined religion.

A good account of the Brinjaras is given by Reginald Heber, Bishop of Calcutta, in his “Indian Travels.” “We passed a large encampment of ‘Brinjaras,’” he writes, “or carriers of grain, a singular wandering race, who pass their whole time in transporting this article from one part of the country to another, seldom on their own account, but as agents for more wealthy dealers. They move about in large bodies with their wives, children, dogs and loaded bullocks. The men are all armed as a protection against petty thieves. From the sovereigns and armies of Hindustan they have no apprehensions. Even contending armies allow them to pass and repass safely, never taking their goods without purchase, nor even preventing them, if they choose, from victualling their enemy’s camp. Both sides wisely agree to respect and encourage a branch of industry, the interruption of which might be attended with fatal consequences to both.”

The Brinjaras’ disguise not only served as a convenient cloak for the Dacoits, but they sometimes followed the nefarious business on their own account. The larger number no doubt were fairly honest and industrious people, but some succumbed to the temptation of their roving life and the facilities offered for criminal acts in their extensive wanderings, taking to Dacoity and to the kidnapping of children, a profitable business, especially of female children for whom there was a ready sale. General Charles Hervey, the famous Indian police officer, had but a poor opinion of the Brinjaras, whom he called formidable robbers. His account of them is, however, interesting as supplementing Bishop Heber’s. He came across them in large numbers at the Sambhur Salt Lake not far from Jeypore, which they visited from the most distant regions, with immense droves of pack bullocks, bringing grain and taking away salt. He says: “Their animals may be seen tethered in hundreds on the wide shores of the extensive lake, each tanda or company of their sort being camped under a distinct Naik, or headman, in the centre of the drove appertaining to it, with their bullock packs or panniers neatly collected in piles of hundreds in their midst. In the daytime, when halted, their cattle are taken out to pasture wherever pasture may be obtained, tended by the fewest men, often mere lads, and not infrequently by girls; at evening they are driven home, when a piece of oil-cake is given to each animal, called by name, and it is curious to watch the process, how well each animal knows its name and waits expectantly for its turn to be called. At night the bullocks are tethered by means of a rope passed round their front feet and entwined with another rope fixed to the ground with strong stakes. They are picketed in this manner with their heads turned inwards, in a circle round the resting place of their owners in their midst, and fires are kept burning throughout the night to scare away tigers or other beasts of prey. I have come upon the encampments of these roving people, in the wildest jungles, or threading their way with their long straggling lines of laden cattle through the most intricate ground, whether of rock, forest, sand-hills, or marsh, and have been quite fascinated by the strangeness of their manner and their quaint wild ways.”

Another successful disguise made use of by the Dacoits in Central India was that of the garb and appearance of Alkuramies, a peculiar class of pilgrims who travelled in small parties accompanying a high priest, who was represented as the leader of the gang. “They had four or five tents, some of white and some of dyed cloth, and two or three pairs of nakaras, or ‘kettle drums,’ and trumpets, with a great number of buffaloes, cows, goats, sheep and ponies. Some were clothed, but the bodies of the greater part were covered with nothing but shoes and a small cloth waistband. Those who had long hair went bareheaded and those who had nothing but short hair wore a piece of cloth round the head.” The pretended Alkuramies always took the precaution of hiring the services of half a dozen genuine Byragees or ascetics, whom they put forward in difficult emergencies.

They are strange people, these Byragees, or religious devotees, whether pretended or real. There are many classes of them with various names: Jogis, Sunyasis, Byragis, Aghunhotas, and mostly all incorrigible rogues. When travelling in bands they are stalwart naked fellows, strong-limbed and sturdy, unpleasant to meet abroad despite their sham sanctity. Their solicitation of alms is more like a threat as they offer their begging bowls, peremptorily demanding contributions. They do not whine or fawn like ordinary beggars, but lift their voices in execration when their appeals are not readily met and with their naked slate-coloured bodies raised to their full height, they cast dust into the air to emphasise their maledictions. Whether by alms or thefts, the mendicant leads an easy, lazy life, his needs are well cared for by the charitable who firmly believe they “acquire merit” by ministering to them.

General Charles Hervey has given a graphic account of a Byragee he came across at Thunjna on the edge of Rajputana, whose lair or mhut was on one of the hills above the town. It was “erected nearly at the very top of it among several overhanging rocks, and reached only by a long parapeted causeway, all substantially constructed of solid masonry, but not yet completed. The ascetic in possession was in the usual nude condition, four square inches of rag forming his entire personal apparel. His body was covered with ashes, his head folded round and round with his own braided hair like a tall tiara, and his face and forehead plastered with white symbolic daubs. Sleek he was, and in good condition withal—not at all a starving mendicant, whatever his penances; and he had a fat pony too, in a well-littered shed close by his own comfortable den, to get up to and scramble into which must cause the good little beast some trouble. I asked the man why thus disfigure himself? I was rebuked for the impertinence by no reply, as, silently beholding me, he squatted on his upraised hams on the stone-built terrace of the lofty spot.... He had, like most of his kind throughout India, wandered to many distant regions and sacred spots, famed from olden times as places to be visited, whatever the difficulties of the pilgrimage.... He had, indeed, been a mighty traveller and persistent pilgrim, this nude, besmeared gymnosophist, of small wants and great energy, and the naked hermit became quite attractive, rapt as he was, however unclothed and unbeauteous, as he narrated his ‘painful marchings’ and the wondrous sights he had beheld and bowed down to.

“Other equally devoted and fanatic individuals, leading, like this man, eremitical lives in caves and hovels in wild and unfrequented spots and inaccessible places on crags or rocky eminences by side of river or sea, or on temple-topped hill or difficult mountain peak, held sacred as the abode of their Devi and not to be profaned, may be met with, ... but few so observant or so communicative and friendly.... Many are their devices of evil-doing when abroad; and here I confine the remark to those who are not what they seem to be. Thugs, poisoners and kidnappers are to be found among Jogis. When visiting Dwarka many years ago, I was loudly cursed by a Byragee for not readily enough yielding to his demand for alms, and as I put off from the shore, to give point to his execrations, the angered fellow, stark and gray, seemed a very blue devil, as, standing to his full height and with both arms stretched upwards, he flung dust into the air while uttering his direst maledictions.”

Professional poisoning in carrying out highway robbery was at one time spread over every portion of the province of Bengal, and there is no doubt it was equally prevalent in Bombay and Madras. Murders were constantly committed along the road upon unwary travellers who rashly joined company with strangers deliberately purposing to kill and rob them; and numbers of thefts were also perpetrated by the administration of drugs to render their victims insensible and at their mercy.

The crime was greatly aided by the facility with which poison in some form or other could be obtained. Many shopkeepers traded in poisons, selling these goods openly and with the most reckless indifference. Even when the law laid restrictions on the sale of poisons, the evilly disposed could provide himself from the roots of trees in the jungle, garden or wayside, or they might be bought from the numerous travelling quacks, and the local hakims or “native doctors” were often not unwilling to supply the noxious drugs. Moreover, in almost every village some hag of evil repute, half-witch, half-midwife, given to criminal practices and commonly believed to be a professional poisoner, did a systematic business in supplying drugs. Upon one old woman, who was arrested near Sasseram in 1835, were found letters and credentials from numerous members of the poisoning community at large who dealt with her.

The drug most commonly used by the road poisoners is produced from the datura plant, stramonium, both the purple flowered and the white flowered, and is prepared from the seeds or the leaves. Its noxious effects were well known to the ancients. In “Purchas: His Pilgrimage,” that most famous series of seventeenth century travels, we read, “They have (in India) an Herbe called Durroa which causeth distraction without understanding anything done in a man’s presence; sometimes it maketh a man sleepe as if hee was dead for the space of four and twenty hours and in much quantity it killeth.” It is referred to in Burton’s “Anatomy of Melancholy.” Garcias ab Horto makes mention of “an herbe called daturah, which if it be eaten, for twenty-four hours following takes away all sense of grief, makes them incline to laughter and mirth.” As an instrument in facilitating theft and other criminal designs its properties were widely recognised. In Bengal it was usually given as an ingredient of sweetmeats, or mixed with bread or coffee, sherbet, milk, tari, “native spirits,” or introduced into tobacco. It was relied upon to stupefy; not necessarily to kill, but to produce intoxication or delirium, or profound lethargy resembling coma, with dilated pupils but natural respiration. Even when life is not seriously endangered, the effects of the poison upon the person are such that they seldom recover their bodily vigour. One was still a cripple after a dose taken seven years before; another continued unable to articulate and was like a man stricken with paralysis. Memory is long impaired and often never recovered; idiocy sometimes supervenes. The detection of the crime is thus prevented. If death occurs, it may be attributed to disease, suicide or wild beasts; if the patient survives, he has no clear idea what has happened to him.

The action of datura is generally an indication that it has been administered. It is not only a powerful narcotic, but there are quite unmistakably characteristic symptoms. The patient, if not incapable of movement, will perform the most fantastic antics, will exhibit great excitement, ramble in his talk, fly into a violent rage when questioned. As it takes effect, the sufferer grows very thirsty, and dry in the throat. There are three stages or sets of symptoms observed: First, headache, dryness of the mucous membrane, difficulty in walking, languor, impairment of vision, with the pupils greatly dilated; second, maniacal delirium, flushed face, eyes glistening, violent perspiration from incessant motion; third, insensibility, coma and possibly collapse with fatal results. In the last condition the sufferer becomes giddy, staggers, falls and dies.

Some of the cases of poisoning by datura may be quoted here to show the boldness with which it was practised. One crime was committed in a Jain temple near Bhagalpur in Bengal, where the victims were the priest and two of his attendants. The latter were found one morning in a state of mad intoxication, reeling about the ground, and the priest was missing, but his body was picked up three days afterward in a dry well. It was the work of a gang of professional poisoners who had visited the temple ostensibly to make an offering to the god but in reality to murder the priest. One of them bought sweetmeats which were doctored with powdered datura-seed, and handed them over to the priest for presentation. According to custom, he ate some of the sweetmeats, giving a part also to the two temple attendants. The poisoners waited till the drug had taken effect and then attacked the priest who was lying unconscious near the shrine; one of them throttled him; a second sat heavily upon his chest; a third held his hands, and a fourth trampled him underfoot. The helpless victim soon died in convulsions. The next act was to rifle the secret treasury kept in an inner chamber, and the plunder was stowed in sacks and carried away in a cart. In the end by the aid of “approvers” seven of the robbers were arrested. Three were sentenced to death, and the others to transportation for life to the Andaman Islands.

Numerous victims of the crime of road poisoning were found among the Powindahs or Afghan traders who travel down every year from above the passes on the northwest frontier and who brought their strings of camels laden with merchandise and products of the soil, or drove a good business in horse-dealing. They sold cloth and shawls, condiments, sun-dried fruits, sweetmeats, valuable furs, long-haired Persian cats, strong, surefooted little horses called yaboos. They visited all parts of India as far as Cape Comorin, and when their goods were sold, congregated at certain points for the homeward journey, and with their wallets well-lined, they were a likely prey for the poisoners. Although shrewd bargainers, they are an unwary lot not difficult to dupe and cajole. These “Cabulis,” as they were styled, were at one time the constant victims of datura poisoning in Bombay, where they often collected to enjoy the proceeds of their trading and purchase goods to carry home. Numbers of them were admitted to the hospital suffering from poison, the fatal effects of which they had escaped, thanks to their robust constitutions.

Once at Patna, in Bengal, a horse-dealer from Cabul, who had disposed of his stud profitably, rashly made friends with a couple of rogues whom he met by the way and who had so ingratiated themselves with him as to be accepted as travelling companions. On reaching Benares one of them, who passed as the other’s servant, went on ahead to a Serai to prepare food, which was ready on the arrival of the party and of which the Afghan partook with the others. All were seized with the usual symptoms, and while insensible the horse-dealer was robbed. Again, a party of five, travelling from Calcutta, were beguiled on the way by an obliging stranger whom they presently engaged to go out and buy food for them in the bazaar and prepare it for them. They left the Serai with him to continue their journey by rail, but were found unconscious on the way to the station, having been robbed of their money and most of their apparel.

General Hervey quotes a curious instance of the heredity of the criminal instinct which showed itself in the descendants of the old Thugs settled at Jubbulpore, in the days of the active pursuit of these murderers by Sir William Sleeman. A generation of young Thugs had grown up around the School of Industry, a kind of reformatory for the offspring of the captured criminals, and the careers of some of these have been followed. Many of the youths found employment with European gentlemen as private servants, and in one particular instance the inherited propensity was curiously illustrated. A railway engineer, Mr. Upham, employed in the construction of the Indian Peninsula Railway, was stationed at Sleemanabad near Jubbulpore. Returning home one evening, much fatigued after a long tour of inspection, he lay down to rest on his bed and from his tent, the curtain of which was raised for ventilation, he saw two of his table servants—both of them lads from the reformatory—engaged in cooking his dinner. He presently noticed that they squeezed into the pot on the fire certain green pods they had plucked from a neighbouring bush, and presuming they were herbs of some sort added for flavour, he said nothing, but he was curious and having little appetite he dined very lightly, chiefly on rice and milk. He picked some of the pods, however, and put them in his pocket, where they remained till next day, when he became ill and rode over to see the doctor. He fainted when he reached the doctor’s office. Restoratives being promptly applied, he so far recovered as to be able to produce the pods which the doctor at once pronounced to be of datura. Suspicion thus aroused, the two servants were arrested and brought to trial, when the head cook was convicted and sentenced to six years’ imprisonment. This boy was of the old Thug stock, and obviously the desire to destroy human life was in his blood, brought out by greed; for the object was, of course, to rob Mr. Upham while he was unconscious.

They were apparently irreclaimable, these Thug children. One boy was detained in prison until grown up in the hope that he would prove well-conducted. All his relations had been Thugs; his father (who had been executed), his uncles, brothers and forebears for several generations, and numbers of them had suffered the extreme penalty. He was cognisant of their misdeeds and the retribution that overtook them, but his own inclinations lay the same way, and no sooner was he at large than he embraced the evil trade and was soon known as a jemadar with an increasing reputation as a daring leader of Dacoits. Eventually he was won over to the side of justice and did good service as an “approver.”

A noted Thug poisoner of later days was a certain Rora, the Meerasee—a class of hereditary singers—who was long criminally active and in the end was sentenced to transportation for nineteen years on several counts. His favourite victims were the drivers of bullock hackeries, which with an accomplice he would hire, and after they were taken several stages, he would become friendly with the driver, offering food, drink or tobacco, which was, of course, drugged and produced the usual narcotic effects. When the driver fell off his box insensible, they left him to lie there and made off with the vehicle and its beasts, disposing of them at the first chance. This process was repeated with other carts and conveyances plying for hire, and in all cases datura was the drug employed. This Rora was arrested on one occasion, and having to pass his own house got permission to go in; after which he came out with a gift of poisoned sweetmeats for his escort, and easily escaped when his custodians yielded to the potency of the datura.

A form of highway robbery was the “Megphunnah Thuggee,”—the poisoning of parents to remove them and allow of the kidnapping of their deserted children. The motive of this crime was to become possessed of the jewels and ornaments worn by the children, or to sell the latter at distant places or to wanderers who would carry them to far-off countries for questionable purposes. Brinjaras bought male children to bring up in their trade, and nomadic gipsies with travelling shows wanted females to be reared to their performing business. Thus a gang of Megphunnah thieves assembled for a feast fell upon a family of Yats, father and mother, with two girls and a boy, and having strangled the parents in good old Thug fashion and sold the children, repeated the process continually as they wandered on. The gains were small, but the murders were many and numbers were sold into slavery of the worst sort.

Dacoity was practised on a large scale in many districts by whole gangs under well-known leaders with adherents or well-wishers and informants in every village. At each religious festival in the autumn, the band assembled at the summons of its acknowledged chief in some deserted fort or temple, and settled a plan for the coming season, when operations were discussed; the names of the selected victims, the nature of the expected booty, the chances of resistance or the interference of the authorities. New members were affiliated and sworn in at these meetings and the work went on gaily by the various parties till the approach of the monsoon, when the whole band reassembled, divided the spoil and went into winter quarters. One member of the gang was always a goldsmith, who melted down the ornaments acquired, while silks and clothes were disposed of to friendly shopkeepers.

A long list might be drawn up of the predatory peoples of India. “These criminal tribes,” says Sleeman, “number hundreds of thousands of persons and present a problem almost unknown in European experience. The gipsies, who are largely of Indian origin, are perhaps the only European example of an hereditary criminal tribe. But they are not sheltered and abetted by the landowners as their brethren in India are.” Most prominent among these peoples were the Meenas, or Meena Rhatores, who were found chiefly in Rajputana, but who practised their infamous trade in many parts of India. The name Rhatore is synonymous with Rajput and signifies “of royal race,” but the blue blood was drawn from a family living by plunder and Dacoity. They were settled in considerable numbers at Shajanpore near Gurgaon, and lived outwardly respectable lives, but their propensities were well known. Although they went far afield to carry out their robberies, they occupied substantial stone houses, cultivated the soil and possessed large flocks and herds with many swift camels, mostly hidden away till the time arrived for an expedition to pilfer and despoil. These Meenas were rich and prosperous and wanted nothing but to be let alone; they habitually lived well, ate flesh, drank much, wore fine raiment, and their women disported many trinkets and gorgeous clothes; their rejoicings and festivals were celebrated with much feasting and revelry. They followed no ostensible occupation; they hired servants to till the ground, and their villages had often a deserted appearance because most of the men were absent on some raid. The remaining few, wary and watchful, looked out for possible detection and interference; the women, even when drawing water at the well, were ready to give the signal of alarm or send a word of warning to their friends engaged in some illegal pursuit. The Meenas hung closely together, and if any one was by mischance arrested, he might count upon assistance and upon funds raised by subscription to provide bribes to secure his release, if in the native states, or for the payment of fees for his defence.

Another criminal class very formidable in their time were the Moghyas, whose home was in Meywar in and about the direction of Neemuch. They were notorious for the wide range of their depredations, and being of a treacherous character, they inspired great dread in the regions they infested. They did not confine themselves to their own country, but spread far and wide, and their robberies were so repeated that at one time the high road between Indore and Gwalior was patrolled by parties of irregular cavalry in support of the inefficient local police. These Moghyas came from a common stock of tribal thieves, such as the Budhuks and Khunjurs, and were notable for their favourite custom of taking service as village watchmen or chowkeydars, a strange practice very general throughout India and based upon the old idea of setting a thief to catch a thief.

The Budhuks were professional Dacoits who always murdered their victims; the Khunjurs were wanderers who robbed in many widely separated districts both in Madras and Bombay, and in times far back in Jalna, Bolarum near Secunderabad, at Bellary (Madras) and Sholapore. The Mooltani robbers were assiduous in attacks on convoys of cargoes of piece goods, opium and sugar. There were also Bedowreahs, freebooters and desperados of the North-western Provinces, Kaim Khanees, camel postilions, who were also Dacoits, and Khaikarees and Lambanees, much given to crime in the Dharwan district and so determined in their misdeeds that no severity short of perpetual banishment had any effect on them. After a large capture, the native magistrate sentenced every offender to have his right hand chopped off. Yet they at once resumed their depredations when set free and were long recognised as members of the “lop-handed” gang.

The Ooreahs, or men of Orissa, were poisoners by descent, adepts at dissimulation and low cunning, much given to the despoiling of unsuspecting females of the oldest profession in the world, the hereditary dancing girls who were brought up to the business by their mothers. A troupe of these girls were often maintained privately by rajahs and wealthy natives, and for ceremonial purposes at Hindu temples. Despite the taint of ill-repute attaching to their trade, they were often modest in manner and of refined tastes, very much like the old Grecian “HetÆrÆ”; but when living at large in their public capacity, they were often the victims of greedy miscreants who coveted their possessions, their plentiful ornaments and jewelry, for many were personally rich. The Ooreahs worked in gangs and three of them visited the house of some of these women in Dum-Dum and brought with them a present of food, curry cooked by themselves and drugged. This had the usual effect and ended in a great robbery. Again, four Ooreahs took lodgings with a woman in the Sham Bazaar, near Calcutta, and established friendly relations, exchanging sweetmeats. Those given by the Ooreahs soon produced insensibility, and the poisoners cleared out the place.

In 1869 information reached a gang of Dacoits on the look-out for booty that a large consignment of treasure had been received at Agra by railway from Calcutta. It was to be transferred at Agra to camel-back, to be forwarded to its destination at Jeypore. The leader of the Dacoits and many others were lurking around drawn by the scent of rich prey on the skirts of the great Durbar then in progress. They prudently resolved to delay attack until the spoil was upon native territory, and it was watched from stage to stage until the convoy had entered a pass or hilly gorge one march from Jeypore. The party halted for the night to bivouac in the bazaar of a place called Molumpoona, where they were challenged by pretended revenue officers, who were Meena Dacoits disguised, and accused of trying to evade the transit dues. The real character of the officials was soon made manifest when the escort, who were soldiers or policemen, ran off, and the plunder was secured. It consisted of a large amount in rupees and silver in bricks, coral beads and other valuables.

The audacity of these Dacoits reached to greater heights. The royal mails were not safe from their interference. By maintaining spies in the various post-offices, news was always forthcoming of the approaching despatch of a valuable prize by the government mail carts or Dak runners from Agra to the adjacent native states. Almost at the same time as the last named robbery took place, a detachment from the main gang stopped the mail cart and seized its contents, carrying off a quantity of bullion in British sovereigns. A second similar robbery was also effected on the Ajmere frontier, in which the post-office employee was wounded. These treasure Dacoities were no doubt facilitated by the niggardliness of the transmitters, who sought to save the expense of hiring a special escort notwithstanding the enormous amount at stake, as much as thirty lacs of rupees, or £300,000, having been passed at times from Bombay to Indore.

On one occasion in 1864, a police confederate gave notice of a consignment of treasure, 30,000 rupees, from Bombay, passing through Berar, which was intercepted and attacked in a ravine near Mulkapore. The mail cart arrived about dusk, when the robbers fell upon it and the drivers, and the small escort of four matchlock men fled. The bullion was loaded quickly on camels, carried away and buried in the jungle before the news of the theft reached Mulkapore. A month later, when the booty was about to be divided among the different gangs engaged, they quarrelled fiercely over the shares and one of the party stole away and brought the police upon the scene. The treasure was thus recovered and many important arrests were made.

This money had been forwarded up country to be employed in the purchase of cotton at a time when the great American War of Secession had paralysed the cotton industry, and great enterprise was being shown in obtaining the scarce commodity. This “cotton hunger” extended to India, and the productive cotton fields there were being despoiled to meet the demand. Heavy remittances in cash were in consequence constantly transmitted up country, and the temptation was great to highway robbers. It was the same with regard to opium, largely produced in the province of Malwa. Not only was the drug itself plundered in transit to Bombay, but the purchase money of the goods was intercepted on its way to pay the cultivators.

Many noted Dacoits rose into prominence when the crime was most prevalent. One was Jowahirra Durzee, a thief of the boldest type who wandered through Central India planning and executing robberies. There were thirteen such crimes to his credit in the province of Berar and eight more around Poona. He was a fine-looking man who was caught by the Nizam of Hyderabad and sentenced to be beheaded, but who escaped from gaol with the connivance of the native guard. He renewed his activity and made a great haul in Berar, robbing a couple of country carts conveying cash to the value of 66,000 rupees sent from Bombay for the purchase of cotton. The thieves had only time to bury their plunder and disperse, but returned a month later to dig it up and divide it. After making Poona the centre of operations, he was again arrested and committed to the British lock-up at Jalna, from which he was rescued by a daring comrade, Kishen Sing, who forced an entrance into the prison by climbing the wall and overpowering the sentry.

Afterward Jowahirra, when retaken, described what had occurred. Two steel clasp knives with file blades had been conveyed from Bombay and smuggled into the prison. With these the prisoners cut through their leg-irons in six days, after which their friends came and carried them off to where three swift camels were waiting for them outside the town. The Indian criminals are ingenious in dealing with their fetters to compass escape. They are independent of files. Thirty of the worst prisoners confined in the central gaol of Agra contrived to cut through their irons by means of threads manufactured from their clothing and thickly coated with pounded glass or emery powder. The threads were first anointed with gum to which the powder adhered, thus forming a sawing instrument equal to a file. Jowahirra’s subsequent depredations were on a large scale. He was often associated with the notorious Dacoit Jeewun Sing, (of whom more directly), and they controlled large numbers of tribal thieves, Meenas and Rhatores and Rohillas, who were at one time computed to amount to nearly four hundred. Jowahirra was in due course tried as a professional Dacoit and sentenced to fourteen years’ transportation to the Andaman Islands.

Jeewun Sing was a native of Bikaneer and a camel carrier who conveyed specie and other consignments for the bankers of Berar, and as such he enjoyed a reputation for honesty and fair dealing in the delivery of goods entrusted to him. Yet he was in collusion with Meena Dacoits who came down from the country in quest of plunder, and whom he harboured and hid in two temples near Oomraotee until news came of treasure on the move. Jeewun Sing, who had taken service with the Mypore police for his personal safety, secretly directed these gangs and was concerned in several of the heaviest robberies, receiving always his share of the proceeds,—a fourth or fifth. He did not join personally in the work, but sent agents to represent him. He was a general carrier, whose camels travelled to Bombay, Indore, Jeypore, Jubbulpore, and who was true to his employers as a cloak to his proceedings against others. This police inspector, so long the confederate of robbers, lived under a cloud and his arrest was often strongly urged, but he was spared through the protection of his police superiors, and not a little on account of his usefulness in securing the conviction of others. But this double traitor, disloyal to his sect and the betrayer of his confederates, was in the end dismissed from the service.

Kishen Sing, the noted Rhatore leader of Dacoits who rescued Jowahirra Durzee, was one of the chief agents of this same Jeewun Sing. Kishen Sing was informed against by his confederate, Choutmull, for declining to submit to his demands and was supposed to have died in custody at Aboo. The story of this fictitious death so admirably illustrates Eastern duplicity that it deserves mention. Kishen Sing was a desperate character whose crimes were many and atrocious. He murdered one of his associates in a mail cart robbery; he attacked two sepoys going on furlough, and in the fight which ensued slew one while he himself was wounded; and he was in the habit of disguising himself as an officer in the Nizam’s cavalry in order to carry out his robberies. One of his most daring deeds was rifling a treasure convoy on the high-road between Sholapore and Hyderabad. The money was 30,000 rupees in specie and some chests of bullion, and was carried in the wagons of a transit agency under escort of some Arab mercenaries. A fierce conflict was fought, but the Dacoits got the best of it and carried off the treasure. Later Kishen Sing was arrested and laid by the heels at Mount Aboo to await trial.

He was resolved to escape his fate of certain transportation. First he tried to commit suicide with a piece of glass, then he simulated madness and at last took to malingering. He was seized with a terrible hacking cough and grew visibly worse, so that his release as incurable was all but recommended. Then he apparently died. Leave was sought from the local authorities to bury him and not burn him as was the usual procedure with a Hindu corpse. His body was handed over for interment to four or five low caste men engaged by an old and faithful follower of his who had taken the garb of a mendicant and occupied a small hut just outside the gaol gates. The undertakers were in the secret, and they placed the living corpse in a shallow grave face downward, covering it with thorns and brushwood, on the top of which a thin layer of earth was laid. The defunct made no move, and after dark the faithful Gosaen, who had been on the watch, came and dug up the “dead” Kishen Sing. It was thus clearly proved that burial did not mean death and that, provided a person is placed faced downwards with no superincumbent weight of earth, life may be safely prolonged for hours. The escape of Kishen Sing was not realised until he was discovered alive and well in his native village. How he imposed upon the medical officer whose duty it was to furnish a certificate of death does not appear upon the record.

A curious feature in Indian Dacoity was that gangs were led in more than one instance by female jemadars or captains. One of the most notable was a certain Tumbolin whose husband had met his deserts in the Madras territory and had been executed. After his death, his wife was installed in his place by the universal acclaim of his followers, and she fully justified her appointment. She became a most capable chief, ably managed all the affairs of the gang, sought out the needful information as to the promise of spoil, the best methods of attack, and settled every preliminary. She went with her men to the point of action, but did not join personally in the fray, leaving the actual command to a trusty lieutenant, by name Himtya, chosen by herself, and who became her right hand man.

One of the boldest operations ever attempted by Dacoits was the attack made by Tumbolin’s gang upon a military treasure in the heart of the military cantonments of Sholapore. In quest of booty, she had brought her party down in person from Central India and had encamped at Nuldroog, about fifteen miles from Sholapore, a wild spot within the territory of the Nizam of Hyderabad. Accompanied by her faithful Himtya and others, disguised as wandering minstrels, she explored the neighbourhood and penetrated the military quarter of Sholapore. They sang their songs before the officers’ bungalows and at last boldly entered the general’s garden in which a sentry was posted. Over the hedge they saw a sentry, and more to the purpose, saw that he was in charge of the treasure chest of the military force. Meanwhile Himtya had gone off independently and had marked down as a hopeful prey the house of a wealthy tobacconist and banker in the town of Sholapore.

The two enterprises were discussed that night on return to camp, and although the banker’s promised to be the easiest job, an attack upon a military force was the most audacious and, if successful, would secure the largest prestige. It was decided to attempt the latter enterprise, pausing for a day or two in order to reconnoitre their ground, the best means of approach, and the surest line of retreat if pursued. The British garrison was large and consisted of a native infantry and a troop of European horse artillery. It was an important station where many high officials resided, judge, collector and magistrate, and a local gaol was established within the fort. It was a hard nut to crack, but Tumbolin did not despair. First removing their encampment to some distance, the rendezvous was fixed on some broken ground near the deposited treasure, which was last seen by Himtya when being locked up in the right hand compartment of the tumbril.

At nightfall the sepoy sentry guard retired into their guard room, leaving a double sentry to guard the treasure. Himtya’s first step was to secure the guard by locking them into their quarters; then he and his men crept up under cover of a tall cactus hedge until they reached the tumbril, when two of the Dacoits rushed simultaneously upon the two sentries and speared them, while a third robber broke off the padlock of the tumbril and laid open the right compartment of the treasure chest. It was empty, for the money had been transferred that very day to the other side. By this time, the alarm had been raised. The sentry in the general’s garden adjoining opened fire, and some of the officers ran up with shot-guns, by which one of the robbers was wounded. The attack had failed and the tables were turned. The bugles rang out with a general call to arms and the baffled Dacoits hastily decamped.

Pursuit followed, but the robbers were fleet of foot and arrived safely at their encampment, where all was in readiness for flight, ponies were mounted, Tumbolin astride on her favourite piebald, and they galloped away through the night and the next day until the party reached and crossed the Kistna, after which they were beyond pursuit. Great commotion had been caused in Sholapore. The troops stood to their arms all night and patrols of cavalry scoured the whole country round. The English general in command reported that Sholapore had been attacked by a numerous and well-organised banditti, but, as a matter of fact, Tumbolin’s whole gang numbered no more than sixteen persons.

Tumbolin long continued her depredations and her success was great. Ten years after the attack on Sholapore, her gang visited the city of Poona at a moment when the chief of police was being married and the entire force was in attendance upon the marriage procession. Himtya seized the occasion to break into the house of a rich Marwaree merchant and rifle his strong room. The attack was made with flaring torches and a great outcry and succeeded, but two of the robbers were captured as they fled through the town, one of them Himtya himself. Tumbolin escaped and was, indeed, never taken, although a large price was put upon her head. She retired at length at a good old age to die peacefully among her own people in the fastnesses of the Oude Terai.

Grassia was a famous leader of Khunjur Dacoits who had become an approver after capture. When he died his widow, a woman of fine presence and masculine gait, consecrated her children by a solemn oath to their father’s profession. She seemed to anticipate that the boys would be worth little at the work, but relied upon her one girl to turn into a capable leader such as Tumbolin. Grassia’s daughter grew up into a fine woman, with no particular good looks, but of imposing aspect. She never married, bearing in mind her mother’s injunctions to devote herself to the care of her brothers, and to keep Tumbolin before her as a model for imitation, and she no doubt led her gang with much energy and success. In older times there were female Thugs, women who accompanied their husbands on expeditions, and one is mentioned by Sleeman who was the jemadar of a gang of her own.

A horrible story of a Dacoit’s revenge is told by Mr. Arthur Crawford. After an outbreak of the Bheels in October, 1858, which was commenced by one of their number, Bhagoji Naique, shooting the superintendent of the police near Sinnur, the majority of the Bheels took to Dacoity under the leadership of Bhagoji. At this time an old Bheel named Yesoo, a friend of Bhagoji’s, was living in the same neighbourhood in a village which was a favourite camping ground for Europeans on account of the facilities it offered for sport. Yesoo was on very friendly terms with the sportsmen and endeavoured to dissuade Bhagoji from his traitorous designs, but without success. After the murder of the police official, Yesoo refused to join the rebels, and was excused on account of his age and lameness and left to live in peace in his village, Bhagoji little thinking that all the while he was secretly supplying the English with valuable information concerning the plans and whereabouts of the Dacoits. When the disturbance had been quelled and an amnesty proclaimed, one of Bhagoji’s most faithful adherents returned to his home and settled down quietly in his native village not far from Yesoo, who by this time was well known to have been a government informer and was very proud of the fact. This apparently did not affect Hanmant, who tried to be on good terms with the old man, and frequently visited him, inviting him to bring his family over to his (Hanmant’s) village. But Yesoo was wary and kept the young man at arm’s length. Hanmant, finding all attempts to lure the old man away from the security of his own village in vain, conceived a diabolical plot to bring about his revenge. “Taking some fifteen or twenty of his own people and a few more Bheels who had sworn to be revenged on Yesoo, he repaired one night to Yesoo’s village, silently surrounded the Bheel quarter, and then sent one of his men to fire the village stackyard at the other side of the village. Just as he anticipated, the alarm was no sooner given than every male Bheel in the ‘Warra’ (their quarters outside the village proper), including Yesoo and his two sons, went off at best speed to the fire, the women and children collecting outside their huts to view the blaze. In an instant the revengeful gang surrounded the ‘Warra,’ and with his own hand Hanmant cut down and horribly mutilated Yesoo’s two wives and daughters, the other women were gagged and bound, and then Hanmant and a select few, armed with matchlocks, lay in ambush by the path Yesoo and his sons must return by. Yesoo he shot with the muzzle of his gun nearly touching his body, and the sons and one Bheel who showed fight were disposed of by his comrades; the other Bheels dispersed, while Hanmant and his gang quietly returned home. Suspicion, of course, immediately fell upon Hanmant. One of his confederates peached. Hanmant escaped into the jungle, but was caught half-famished about a week afterward. Ultimately he and two accomplices were executed at the scene of the murder, Hanmant exulting up to the last moment in the dreadful deed, which he had been brooding over for nearly five years.”