connected with it — the treatment of the old jágírdárs — was in some respects left open and formed the one point of friction between the brothers.
These jágírdárs were men of position who had received from Ranjít Singh, or acquired by the sword or by services, grants of land called jágírs. Dalhousie gave the Board instructions in respect of these and other rent-free tenures — specifying however six classes of cases — in which the decision on them should depend for each case on its own merit. That there would be differences of opinion he well knew, but he held that this would do good and not harm. But they gradually became so numerous as to involve a very weighty mass of contention, and a serious one, because the question affected the divergent responsibilities of the two brothers — John's, in his capacity as local Chancellor of the Exchequer and his consequent aims at the minimizing of the expenditure; Henry's, in his position as the head of the Administration, in charge of the political department, with the duty of pacifying the Province and securing the good-will and friendliness of the community, of the men of weight as well as of the peasantry and the mass of the people. Apparently all the cases in which they did not agree had to be referred to Lord Dalhousie, and his decisions were more frequently in accordance with John's opinions than with Sir Henry's, who began to feel, therefore, that he did not hold in reality as in name the position of Head of the Administration, of Primus inter pares,
