Some records of crime: Being the diary of a year, official and particular, of an officer of the Thuggee and Dacoitie police

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1892 Excerpt: ... predecessor, Kurrum Sing, showed that nineteen miserable victims were similarly there sacrificed, of whom only one was a khuwas, or slave-girl, eight being his wives, and the rest their " companions." That of his father, Rae Sing, displayed the figures of six wives burnt with his corpse; with Maharajah Soor Sing four wives were immolated. With Maharajah Soojun Sing, whose superb monument, quasi chetrie, of red sandstone, was reared upon as many as twenty-four fine pillars of marble (eight to sixteen being the number usually supporting the other edifices,) ten women achieved Suttee, eight of them being his married wives. But the chetrie of Maharajah Jorawur Sing recorded the terrible story that twenty-tico women submitted to be burnt with that famed ruler's remains, of whom two only were his wives or princesses, nineteen were their suhclees or "companions," and the remaining one the poor Brahminee water-carrier of the entire zenana!9 Horrified--appalled--I felt constrained to take up Melpomene's lament--I am sure I did so in my sickened mind--and to exclaim with her and the conjured-up multitude of breast-beating weepers and mourners, " Hoi, hoi!" Woe, woe! 8 P.S.--Tod, in the account of his visit to the cenotaphs at Mundore, the ancient capital of Marwar, relates that one of the number showed that "no less than sixty-four females accompanied the shade of Maharajah Ajeet Sing (contemporary of Feroksher of Delhi) to the Mansion of the Sun; but this was twenty short of the number who became Suttees when Boodh Sing, Rajah of Boondi (an intrepid general of Aurungzebe, and a contemporary of Ajeet Sing,) ' was accidentally drowned.'" Arguing upon the circumstance of the number of Suttees on each occasion being sculptured up...