PUBLIC FUNCTIONARY, GOVERNMENT OFFICER, TRADER OR FOREIGN SOJOURNER, IN BRITISH INDIA, And the Adjacent Parts of Asia IMMEDIATELY CONNECTED WITH THE HONOURABLE THE EAST INDIA COMPANY. BEING A DIGEST OF THE WORK OF THE LATE CAPT. WILLIAMSON, With many Improvements and Additions; EMBRACING THE MOST VALUABLE PARTS OF SIMILAR PUBLICATIONS ON THE ECONOMY OF LIFE AND CONDUCT IN THAT IN- TERESTING QUARTER OF THE WORLD. BY J. B. GILCHRIST, LL.D. LONDON: PUBLISHED BY KINGSBURY, PARBURY, & ALLEN, BOOKSELLERS TO THE HON. EAST INDIA COMPANY, *1825. PREFACE. THE Volume now offered to the public is chiefly designed to communicate the information supplied by a residence of 22 years at Bombay and Bengal. During that period, many opportunities of visiting the districts under those presidencies, have afforded a considerable acquaintance with topics, the correct knowledge of which must be highly important, not only to the military or naval officer, but to those engaged in the civil departments of every description; who may thus be assisted justly to appreciate the character of the natives, and also of the European society in British India. In order to render this Volume more acceptable to those readers for whose information it has been compiled, a familiar rather than a didactic style has been generally adopted. The same intention has precluded a rigid arrangement, under abstract heads and chapters, or any attempt to render the contents at large too philosophically diffuse. From the commencement of the present century, and |