Page:A Statistical Account of Bengal Vol 1 GoogleBooksID 9WEOAAAAQAAJ.pdf/129

114 beards. It appears that Titu had ordered his followers to wear beards of a certain length, upon which the Hindu landlords imposed a tax of half a crown on each Muhammadan tenant who wore a beard. This and other petty oppressions were resisted; and Titu Miyán, at the head of an infuriated peasant following, commenced a pillaging tour on all the Hindu landlords in the neighbourhood. A series of agrarian outrages followed, ending in the insurgents entrenching themselves in a fortified camp, and defying and beating back the English authorities with some slaughter. The whole of the country north and east of Calcutta, including the 24 Parganás, Nadiyá and Faridpur, lay at the mercy of insurgent bands between three and four thousand strong. The sectaries began by sacking a village in Faridpur District, because one of the inhabitants refused to accept their divine mission. In Nadiya District, a second village was plundered, and a mosque burnt down. Meanwhile contributions of money and rice were levied from the Faithful; and on the 23d October the insurgents selected the village of Náríkelbáriá in the 24 Parganás for their headquarters, and erected a strong bamboo stockade around it. On the 6th November they marched out to the number of five hundred fighting men, attacked a small town, and after murdering the priest, slaughtered two cows, with whose blood they defiled a Hindu temple, and whose carcases they scoffingly hung up before the idol. They then proclaimed the extinction of the English rule, and the re-establishment of the Muhammadan power. Incessant outrages followed, the general proceeding being to kill a cow in a Hindu village, and if the people resisted, to murder or expel the inhabitants, plunder their houses, and burn them down. They were equally bitter, however, against any Muhammadan who would not join their sect; and on one occasion, in sacking the house of a wealthy and obdurate Musalmán, varied the proceedings by forcibly marrying his daughter to the head of their band.

‘After some ineffectual efforts by the District Authorities, a detachment of the Calcutta Militia was sent out on the 14th November against the rebels. They, however, refused all parley; and the officer in command, being anxious to save bloodshed, ordered the Sepoys to load with blank cartridge. The insurgents poured out upon us, received a harmless volley, and instantly cut