Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/770

730 him. Unfortunately, too, he was not overwise; and he had a habit of telling tales against himself, partly out of bravado, which of course did not tend to improve matters. People are very apt to be taken at their own valuation, especially if their valuation be a bad one. It must not be supposed that I am giving countenance, colour, or belief to these rumours against Burton for a moment: on the contrary, I believe them to be false and unjust; but false and unjust though they were, they were undoubtedly believed by many, and herein was the gathering of the cloud which hung over Burton's head through the earlier part of his official career. To prove that I am not drawing on my own imagination with regard to this theory, I quote the following, told in Burton's own words:—

"In 1845, when Sir Charles Napier had conquered and annexed Sind, ... it was reported to me that Karachi, a townlet of some two thousand souls, and distant not more than a mile from camp. . . . Being then the only British officer who could speak Sindi, I was asked indirectly to make inquiries, and to report upon the subject; and I undertook the task on the express condition that my report should not be forwarded to the Bombay Government, from whom supporters of the conqueror's policy could expect scant favour, mercy, or justice. Accompanied by a Munshi, Mirza Mohammed Hosayn Shiraz, and habited as a merchant, Mirza Abdullah the Bushiri passed many an evening in the townlet, visited all the porneia, and obtained the fullest details, which were duly dispatched to Government House. But the 'Devil's Brother'