had practically ceased to exist as a
religion; and he had the privilege of seeing it entirely suppressed
as such before giving up this work for the Residentship at Lucknow.

He was described when taking over the latter appointment as follows:
'He had served in India nearly forty years. His work had been of the
best. He had done more than any one to suppress 'Thuggee' finally,
and had a knowledge of the Indian character and language possessed by
very few. He was personally popular with all classes of Indians, and
respected, feared, and trusted by all.'

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES BY THE EDITOR

Captain J. L. Sleeman, who had intended to contribute an account in
some detail of his grandfather's operations for the suppression of
Thuggee, has been ordered on active service, and consequently has
been unable to write more than the short note printed above.

The editor thinks it desirable to supplement Captain Sleeman's
observations by certain additional remarks.

The earliest historical notice of Thuggee appears to be the statement
in the History of Firoz Shah Tughlak (1351-88) by a contemporary
author that at some time or other in the reign of that sovereign
about one thousand Thugs were arrested in Delhi, on the denunciation
of an informer. The Sultan, with misplaced clemency, refused to
sanction the execution of any of the prisoners, whom he shipped off
to Lakhnauti or Gaur in Bengal, where they were let loose. (Elliot
and Dowson, _Hist. of India_, iii. 141.) That absurd proceeding may
well have been the origin of the system of river Thuggee in Bengal,
which possibly may be still practised.

The next mention of Thugs refers to the reign of Akbar (1556-1605).
Both Meadows Taylor and Balfour affirm that many Thugs were then
executed, and according to Balfour, they numbered five hundred and
belonged to the Etawah District, I have not succeeded in finding any
mention of the fact in the histories of Akbar--the memory of the
event may be preserved only by oral tradition. Etawah, between the
Ganges and Jumna, in the province of Agra, has always been notorious
for Thuggee and cognate crime.

In the year 1666, towards the close of Shahjahan's reign, the
traveller de Thevenot noted that the road between Delhi and Agra was
infested by Thugs. His words are:

'The cunningest Robbers in the World are in that Countrey. They use a
certain slip with a running-noose, which they can cast with so much
slight about a Man's Neck, when