CHAPTER I.
His Highness the Nizam.
When, after a year in India, I visited the city of Hyderabad (Deccan), I like many English people fell under its spell. The unique scenery, the orientalism, the gorgeous colouring of streets and houses, the palaces of a ruler and of nobles who seemed to belong to mediæval times, the marriage processions with blazonment and fireworks, the secluded ladies of whom such wondrous tales were related, and above all, perhaps, the absolutism of the ruler—these things glamoured my imagination and made me think of the India I had read and thought about in England, the India that no longer exists under the prosaic rule of Englishmen.
Encircled by great rocks and crags, which resemble the fortifications of ancient cities, and are believed by the common people to have been placed in position by giants, the city of Hyderabad, with its suburbs, and the fort of Golconda, gave me enough to think about during the short time that I spent among the ruling community—-
