Excerpt from The Timely Retreat, or a Year in Bengal Before the Mutinies, Vol. 2 of 2<br><br>All the Puharries (rajpoots, as they call themselves) keep a race of slaves called Dhoomes, taken originally in battle, I be lieve. The women are always to be seen dressed in a dark blanket, tied round the waist, and fastened over the left shoulder, the right left free. The Puharries sell their female children openly. Every wife has to be bought. An American missionary told us, when making a tour through the hills, he met a man with a pretty little girl about eight years old. The missionary asked several questions about the child, and at last the man, supposing he meant to buy her, said he would give her for three hundred rupees. He had already sold all his other children, but ex pected more for this one, as she was the prettiest. These poor ignorant creatures have some absurd delusions. If you look at a woman through a telescope, she instantly sits down, and refuses to move till the tele scope disappears. I believe, in old times.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.