This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects. Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_. Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation. The cover image has been modified to include the title, author and publication date, and is, so modified, added to the public domain. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ THE _EAST INDIA_ VADE-MECUM OR =COMPLETE GUIDE= TO GENTLEMEN INTENDED FOR THE _CIVIL, MILITARY, OR NAVAL SERVICE_ OF THE Hon. East India Company. [Illustration] BY CAPTAIN THOMAS WILLIAMSON _Author of ‘The Wild Sports of the East.’_ [Illustration] IN TWO VOLUMES ------- _VOL. I._ ---------------------------- London: PRINTED FOR BLACK, PARRY, and KINGSBURY, Booksellers to the Honorable East India Company, 7, LEADENHALL-STREET ------- 1810. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Printed by Turner and Harwood, St. John’s Square, London. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ TO THE _HON. COURT OF DIRECTORS,_ OF THE =East India Company= ---------- HONORABLE SIRS, _A work professedly undertaken with the view to promote the welfare, and to facilitate the progress, of those young gentlemen who may, from time to time, be appointed to situations under your several Presidencies, will, I flatter myself, receive from your_ HONORABLE COURT _that encouragement the importance of the subject solicits, and to which my own good intentions may justly offer a claim. Under your auspices, my labors cannot fail to prove of public utility, as well as to reward that zeal, and that assiduity, with which they have proceeded, under the alluring hope of meriting the approbation of your_ HONORABLE COURT. _I have the honor to be,_ HONORABLE SIRS, _Your most obedient Servant,_ _THOMAS WILLIAMSON_ London, January 1, 1810. PREFACE ---------- In the volumes now offered to the public, it has been my zealous endeavour to supply those minutiæ and details, which have not, in any distinct manner, been heretofore tendered to its consideration. A residence of more than twenty years in Bengal, during which period I had every opportunity of visiting the several districts under that presidency, has enabled me to afford considerable insight into a variety of topics, which, whether to the statesman, the merchant, the military, or the civil character, should prove highly important, and guide, not only to a just conception of the characters of the natives, and of the European society, in India, but to the removal of that host of doubts, prejudices, and national opinions, which, if suffered to prevail, must occasion every object to be seen through a false medium. With the view to render my labors more acceptable to my juvenile readers, whose welfare is attended to in every page, it appeared to me expedient to adopt rather a familiar, than a didactic, style; so as to lead towards the goal of instruction, in that easy manner which is generally found best suited to that intention. The same principle induced me to avoid any arrangement under abstract heads, or chapters; as well as to render the contents at large philosophically diffuse. The mode adopted in my former publication, ‘THE WILD SPORTS OF THE EAST’, namely, of spelling the Hindostanee words according to English pronunciation, having been highly approved, is continued on this occasion. This plan appears particularly necessary in a work intended chiefly for the use of persons proceeding to India; since nothing could be more unpleasant than a deficiency in respect to intonation; which, being once established in error, must prove extremely difficult of correction. While studying to supply the several desiderata left unnoticed by those gentlemen who have written on subjects relating to India, I felt...