untasted. They compared the humiliating oppression to which they were yoked, under a Mahomedan dynasty, and in some measure treated as beasts of burden, to the freedom they had enjoyed within the last century. Impartial justice and kind treatment had mitigated the evils of their former lot; and these reminiscences, comparatively fresh in their minds, were not susceptible of being erased by any sudden change of circumstances that partially successful rebellion might temporarily have brought. Moreover, their traditional metnorials indicated the degrading and hopeless bondage, so to speak, through which their forefathers had passed, and which was not likely to be forgotten by a people, whose ancestors were reduced through despotism to a position of abject serfs. Influenced, therefore, by such bitter reminiscences, they could not act otherwise than maintain a staunch adherence to the Government where they were strong, and continue virtually neutral where they were weak. They were, in fact, either passively, or actively, loyal.
No doubt the wealthy, high-caste Hindu could have stirred up, and led away into the raging flood tens of thousands of these rustic peasantry by the influence of his social position, religion, and caste; but knowing as he well did that the Mahomedan was the Prime Agitator of the struggle for Empire, as well as at the bottom of the Mutiny, and comprehending to the full extent the ambitious character of that population, he firmly abstained from a share in the rebellion, lest, by the re-establishment of pitiless
