Confessions of a Thug. Taylor Meadows

to 1837, inclusive, there were:—

Transported to Penang, &c.	1,059
Hanged	412
Imprisoned for life with hard labour	87
Imprisoned in default of security	21
Imprisoned for various periods	69
Released after trial	32
Escaped from jail	11
Died in jail	36
	——
	1,727
Made approvers	483
Convicted but not sentenced	120
In jail in various parts not yet tried	936
	——
	3,266

      Added to the above, Captain Reynolds mentioned that, at the time he wrote, upwards of 1,800 notorious Thugs were at large in various parts of India, whose names were known; how many besides existed, it is impossible to conjecture.

      How enormous therefore must have been the destruction of human life and property in India before Thuggee was known to exist or was only partially checked! How many thousands must annually have perished by the hands of these remorseless assassins! Awful indeed is the contemplation; for, during the whole of the troublous times of the Mahratta and Pindharee wars, their trade flourished; nor was it till 1831 that their wholesale system of murder received any serious check: and after its general discovery, the countless and affecting applications from families to the officers of the department to endeavour to procure them some knowledge of the places where their missing relatives had been destroyed, that they might have the miserable satisfaction of performing the ceremonies for the dead—showed how deeply the evil had affected society.

      And not only as described in the following pages has Thuggee existed: since they were written, it has been discovered under several other forms and been found to be extensively practised on the Ganges by men who live in boats, and murder those passengers whom they are able to entice into their company in their voyages up and down the river. But the most refined in guilt are those who murder parents for the sake of their children, to sell them as household slaves, or to dancing women, to be brought up to prostitution.

      Throughout the whole of India, including all territories of native princes, only eighteen officers are employed as superintendents and agents for the suppression of Thuggee; many of whom, besides the labour of this office, which is excessive, have other civil and political duties to fulfil. By a reference to any map, it will at once be seen what enormous provinces or divisions of India fall to the superintendence of each person. Whether it is possible for each to extend to every part of that under his charge the extreme attention and scrutiny which are so imperatively necessary to put an end to this destructive system (for there is no doubt that wherever one well-initiated Thug exists, he will among the idle and dissolute characters which everywhere abound in the Indian population, find numbers to join him), must be best known to the Government of India. It is only sincerely to be hoped that economical considerations do not prevent the appointment of others, if necessary.

      The confessions I have recorded are not published to gratify a morbid taste in any one for tales of horror and of crime; they were written to expose, as fully as I was able, the practices of the Thugs, and to make the public of England more conversant with the subject than they can be at present, notwithstanding that some notice has been attracted to the subject by an able article in the "Edinburgh Review" upon Colonel Sleeman's valuable and interesting work.

      I hope, however, that the form of the present work may be found more attractive and more generally interesting than an account of the superstitions and customs only of the Thugs; while for the accuracy of the pictures of the manners and habits of the natives, and the descriptions of places and scenes, I can only pledge the experience of fifteen years' residence in India, and a constant and intimate association with its inhabitants.

      If this volume in any way contribute to awaken public vigilance in the suppression of Thuggee, or if from the perusal of it, any one in authority rises with a determination to lend his exertions in this good cause of humanity, my time will not have been occupied in vain.

      London, July, 1839.

      M. T.

      CONFESSIONS OF A THUG.

CHAPTER I.

       Table of Contents

      You ask me, Sahib, for an account of my life: my relation of it will be understood by you, as you are acquainted with the peculiar habits of my countrymen; and if, as you say, you intend it for the information of your own, I have no hesitation in relating the whole; for though I have accepted the service of Europeans, in my case one of bondage, I cannot help looking back with pride and exultation on the many daring feats I have performed. Often indeed does my spirit rise at the recollection of them, and often do I again wish myself the leader of a band of gallant spirits, such as once obeyed me, to roam with them wherever my inclination or the hope of booty prompted.

      But the time is past. Life, Sahib, is dear to every one; to preserve mine, which was forfeited to your laws, I have bound myself to your service, by the fearful tenure of denouncing all my old confederates, and you well know how that service is performed by me. Of all the members of my band, and of those with whom chance has even casually connected me, but few now remain at large; many have been sacrificed at the shrine of justice, and of those who now wander, broken, and pursued from haunt to haunt, you have such intelligence as will lead to their speedy apprehension.

      Yet Thuggee, capable of exciting the mind so strongly, will not, cannot be annihilated! Look at the hundreds, I might say thousands, who have suffered for its profession; does the number of your prisoners decrease? No! on the contrary, they increase, and from every Thug who accepts the alternative of perpetual imprisonment to dying on a gallows, you learn of others whom even I knew not of, and of Thuggee being carried on in parts of the country where it is least suspected, and has never been discovered till lately.

      It is indeed too true, Ameer Ali, said I; your old vocation seems to be as flourishing as ever, but it cannot last. Men will get tired of exposing themselves to the chance of being hunted down like wild beasts, and hanged when they are caught; or what is perhaps worse to many, of being sent over the Kala-Panee (transported); and so heartily does the Government pursue Thugs wherever they are known to exist, that there will no longer be a spot of ground in India where your profession can be practised.

      You err, Sahib; you know not the high and stirring excitement of a Thug's occupation. To my perception it appears, that so long as one exists, he will gather others around him; and from the relation of what I will tell you of my own life, you will estimate how true is my assertion. How many of you English are passionately devoted