Amidst such scenes of oppression on one side, and inatten­tion on the other, we ought to praise God, that at the end of the year 1195, the office of Daroga of the Court of Justice, together A. D. 1782. with the Fodjdary, was taken from the hands of the Indians, and transferred to the English Gentlemen immediately; by which revolution the oppressions and sufferings of the people of this land have been upon the whole somewhat alleviated. But as their officers and dependants are a set of people always prone to offer injustice; and these are entrusted with all the details, as well as Deputyships, whilst they make it a point to uphold the corruption and indolence of their masters; it happens that they become in fact the centre and hinge of all decisions; and all matters come to pass through their hands unavoidably, as it appears undeniably that such of their masters, as are preposed to these offices, will not, or cannot, attend personally to their duties. So that there is still left in the sneaker much of the late broth. “O God, come to the assistance of your afflicted people, and set open some door through which they may escape from oppression!” But let us return to our narrative about the several offices set up formerly by our Sovereigns.

The Muhtasib (or Clerk of the Market) was established for The Muhta­sib, an officer that had inspection upon weights, mea­sures, and markets. the purpose of inspecting weights and scales, exposing to view the false bottoms and artifices of Corn-meters and Scale-men, and for fixing the price of grain and other similar commodities. He had a great salary, and some fees; but the latter were rather honorary; and the intent was to render him alert in putting a stop to all altercations and disputes between buyer and seller, by disabling the latter from over-reaching the other. The puni­tion and coercion of the disorderly and insolent was also of his resort. It was his business in particular to take care that no drunken men, or any other people, out of their senses, should walk loose throughout the markets; that no injury or insolence should be offered to any one, by threat, action, or infamous words; and that modest women, obliged sometimes to cross a street or a market, should not be exposed to any insult or indecency, from the voice, hand, or sound of the profligate and thoughtless. But now, every one does as he pleases. The Muhtasibs take a great deal more perquisites than were hereto­fore their due; and in one and the same city the prioes of grain vary in the same market, at the distance of three or four shops, may of three or four yards; and the differences, varieties, and rogueries in weights and scales are risen to such a height, as not to be conceivable. Moreover, not only all the markets and thoroughfares are thronged with disorderly people, and disorderly houses, but every street and every corner is infected with drinking-shops and tippling-houses, with here and there groups of drunken servants, butlers, harcarras, qhalassies*, and sipahis, but especially of servants belonging to the English, a set of disorderly people, who, availing themselves of the respect paid to the men in power to whom they belong, and of the influence they acquire by their being linked together, make nothing of lying in wait, sometimes half naked and half drunk, and quarrel­ling without an antagonist; nor do they make any difficulty of doing and saying whatever they please, and to whom they please; So that Gentlemen accustomed to decency and respect, are at a loss how to go from their homes, upon urgent business, through a market, or along a street, and how to come back again, without being entangled within some mischance or other, in consequence of the words or actions of those insolent people; nor is it uncommon to see them recommend themselves to God Almighty’s safeguard on their going out, and to wish they may come back without being forced into some mischance.

The Vacaa-nuviss, Seva­na-nuviss, and Harcara, &c,

The Vacaa-nuviss, or Remembrancer, or Gazetteer, and the Sevana-nuviss, or Historiographer, and the Harcara, or Spy, were appointed for writing down the events that might happen in the respective provinces, territories, and districts of their residence. Their duty was to inhabit such cities and towns as were the seats of command and Government, to the end that they might have it in their power to write down at day-break such events as should have happened the whole day and night before, and to send the paper to the Emperor. There were posts established, that carried the dispatches, with all speed, and in all weathers, to Court, where a Daroga or Inspector examined the same; after which he reduced to a concise exposition the substance of such as deserved the Imperial notice, presenting at the same time, the whole detail as forwarded by the provincial intelligencers. Nevertheless whatever amongst those papers was addressed personally to the Emperor, was sacred, and could not be set open by any other hand than his own. It was perused by the Monarch himself, who alone could break the seal, and he alone ordered what he thought proper about the contents. By these means the Emperor was informed of The Emperor, by means of the post, minutely and daily informed of almost every material transaction amongst pri­vate people. every private man’s affairs. He knew what one had done to his neighbours at four hundred leagues from Court, and what the latter had done to others; and what such an one wanted from such another, and what this other pretended from his antagonist; he knew all that, and gave directions accordingly. Nor was it uncommon for him to be informed by such a channel of the requests and wishes of the concerned ones; nor at all extraordinary to see directions arrive at the cities of their residence long before their private petitions could have reached the Court. So that the petitioners often had gained their cause in the middle of a distant province, sometime before they had agreed upon the wording of their petitions. But all this correspondence was for the Emperor’s personal inspection only; for if at any time it came to appear, that the secret Gazetteer, or the Remem­brancer, of any other public officer, had himself found means to acquire the least interest with the Imperial Princes, or with the Grandees of the Court, or with the men in eminent station, or was in any connections with them; such a man was forthwith dismissed, and another appointed in his stead; and to this purpose there are yet extant notes written by the Emperor Aoreng-zib’s hand, to his own Vezir, Assed-qhan; and here is a copy of one: