HAMÍRPUR, or Humeerpoor, a British district in the lieutenant-governorship of the North-Western Provinces, India, lying between 25 5 and 26 10 N. lat., and between 79 22 45" and 80 25 15" E. long. It forms the south-western district of the Allahabad division, and is bounded 011 the N. by the Jumna (Jamuna) ; on the N.W. by the native state of Baoni and Betwa river ; on the W, by the Dhasan river; on the S. by Alipura, Chhatarpur, and Charkhari states ; and on the E. by the Banda district. It encloses the native states of Sarila, Jigni, and Bihat, besides portions of Charkhari and Garrauli.
Harnirpur forms part of the great plain of Bundelkhand, which stretches between the banks of the Jumna and the central Vindhyan plateau. The district is in shape an irregular parallelogram, with a general slope northward from the low hills on the southern boundary. The scenery is rendered picturesque by the artificial lakes of Mahoba. These magnificent reservoirs were constructed by the Chandel rajas about 800 years ago, for purposes of irriga tion and as sheets of ornamental water. Many of them enclose craggy islets or peninsulas, crowned by the ruins of granite temples, exquisitely carved and decorated. From the base of this hill and lake country the general plain of the district spreads northward in an arid and treeless level towards the broken banks of the rivers. Of these the prin cipal are the Betwa and its tributary the Dhasan, both of which are unnavigable. There is little waste land, except in the ravines by the river sides. The deep black soil of Bundelkhand, known as mdr, retains the moisture under a dried and rifted surface, and renders the district fertile.
The census of 1872 gives a population of 529,137276,196 males and 252,941 females. The Hindus numbered 493,877, and the Mahometans 33,658. The Chandels and Bundelas, the old dominant classes, have now sunk to 548 and 612 respectively ; most of these still cling to the neighbourhood of Mahoba, the seat of their former supremacy. The district contains 6 towns with a population of more than 5000 souls namely, Rath, Hami rpur, -Mahoba, Maudha, Sumerpur, and Jaitpur. The staple produce of the district is grain of various sorts, the most important being gram. Cotton is also a valuable crop, whose cultiva tion is on the increase. Out of a total area of 1,464,641 acres, 762,212 are under cultivation. Irrigation is practised on only 16,000 acres, chiefly in the south, where water can be obtained from the artificial lakes. Agriculturists suffer much from the spread of the kdns grass, a noxious weed which overruns the fields and is found to be almost ineradicable, wherever it has once obtained a footing. The district is little subject to blight or flood ; but droughts and famine are unhappily common. The scarcity of 1837 and 1868-69 was severely felt in Hamirpur. Commerce is chiefly carried on by means of its great river highway, the Jumna. Cotton and grain, the main exports, are carried downwards ; while rice, sugar, tobacco, and Manchester goods con stitute the principal imports upwards. The manufactures consist of coarse cotton cloth and soapstone ornaments. There is only one metalled road, that between Hami rpur and Naugaon, 70 miles in length. The gross revenue in 1870-71 was 184,646 ; ex penditure, 116,416. In 1871 the police force numbered 534 men, supplemented by 1953 village watchmen (cliaukiddrs), main tained at a cost of 8058. The district contains only one jail: the average number of prisoners in 1850 was 400 ; 1860, 72 ; and 1870, 129. In 1870 the number of schools was 112, with 3066 pupils ; the cost, 1354. The district is divided into 8 fiscal divisions (pargn.nds). The climate is dry and hot, owing to the absence of shade ami the bareness of soil, except in the neighbourhood of the Mahoba lakes, which cool and moisten the atmosphere. The rain fall in 1869-70 was 37 1, and in 1870-71 381 inches.
History.—From the 9th to the 14th century this district was the centre of the Chandel kingdom, with its capital at Mahoba. The rajas adorned the town with many splendid edifices, remains of which still exist, besides constructing the noble artificial lakes already described. At the end of the 12th century Mahoba fell into the hands of the Mussulmans, who retained possession of it for 500 years. In 1680 the district was conquered by Chhatar Sal, the hero of the Bundelas, who assigned at his death one-third to his ally the peslnva of the Marhattas. Until Bundelkhand was con stituted a British district in 1803, there was constant warfare between the Btmdela princes and the Marhatta chieftains. The land had been impoverished by the long war carried on under Chhatar Sal, overrun and ravaged during the Marhatta aggression, and devastated by robber chiefs, so that in 1842 it was reported to be utterly valueless. On the outbreak of the mutiny, Hamirpur was the scene of a fierce rebellion. All the principal towns were plundered by the surrounding native chiefs. Since then the con dition of .the district seems to have improved ; but it has not yet recovered from the long anarchy of Marhatta rule.
Hamírpur, the administrative headquarters of the above district, in 25 53 N. lat. and 80 11 50" E. long., is situ ated on a tongue of land at the confluence of the Betwa and the Jumna, on the right bank of the latter river. It was founded, according to tradition, by Hamir Deo, a Karchuli Rajput expelled from Ulwar (Alwar) by the Mahometans. The town possesses little importance ; there are no manufactures, and quite a limited trade in grain. Population in 1872, 7007.
HAMLET, the hero of Shakespeare s drama, is according to some interpreters an historical or quasi-historical person age, but according to others his story is a mere development or " precipitation " of the great Scandinavian system of mythology. The decision of this point is rendered all the more difficult as the only original authority for the facts (historical or mythological) is the Danish historian Saxo Grammaticns (d. 1204). Though Dr Vigfusson (prolegomena to the Sturlunga Saga, Oxford, 1878) concludes that the Hamlet legend was contained in the Skjoldunga Saga now lost, it is of course matter of question whether Saxo based this portion of his narrative on previous writ ings or collected his material from oral tradition.
Simrock s Quellen des Shakspeare (Bonn, 1870), and summarized in Latham s Dissertations on Hamlet (Lond., 1872, reprinted from Transactions of the Roy. Soc. oj Literature, vol. x., new series), Hamlet s history is briefly as follows. In the days of Rorik, king of Denmark, Gervendill was governor of Jutland, and in this office he was succeeded by his sons Horvendill and Fengo. The former, returning with glory from a viking expedition in which he had defeated Koller, king of Norway, obtained the hand of Gerutha, Rorik s daughter, who in due course bore him a son Amleth. But Fengo, out of jealousy, murdered Horvendill with his own hand, and then persuaded Gerutha to become his wife, on the plea that he had com mitted the crime for no other reason than to avenge her of a husband by whom she had been hated. Amleth, afraid of sharing his father s fate, pretends to be imbecile, but the suspicion of Fengo puts him to various tests, which are related with all the inconsequent simplicity of the ordinary Mdrclien. Despatched to England in company with two attendants, who bear a letter instructing the king of that country to put him to death, he surmises the purport of their instructions, and secretly modifies the inscription on their " tablets " so that the king is requested to put them to death and to treat him with honour. By his wisdom he makes a deep impression on the king, and obtains the hand of the royal princess ; but instead of settling in England he returns at the end of a year to Denmark, where he is supposed to be dead, just as the people are celebrating his obsequies. During the feast that follows he makes the j courtiers all drink freely, and then, when they are heavy with wine and sleep, lie pulls down over them the hangings of the hall, fixes these with pegs which he had sharpened and prepared in the early stage of his folly, and then setting fire to the building leaves the revellers to their fate. He next proceeds to the royal chamber to take vengeance on Fengo himself, who falls beneath the stroke of his own sword, for which Hamlet had substituted his own scabbard- fastened weapon. Returning to England for his wife, the hero finds that his father-in-law and Fengo had been under pledge to each other that the survivor should avenge the other s death if it resulted from violence ; and his father-
in-law, unwilling to make a direct attack on his life, sends
