1 BIRTH AND PARENTAGE OF DULLEEP SING. 03
2 committing the girl to the care of one Jewahir Mull, a rich
3 Hindoo merchant of Umritsir, once Governor of Cashmere,
4 and then in attendance at the Maharajh's Court. This man
5 received orders to take the young* Chunda home with him,
6 and to rear her up at his house in Umritsir. Munnoo was
7 overjoyed at this happy result of his labours, and in his exulta-
8 tion ventured to tell the Maharajh that as the world had
9 now recognized him, Munnoo, as his father-in-law, it mattered
10 little whether he did so or not. On this Runjeet told him,
11 as he had often done before, that he was nothing better than
12 a downright Booroowah — a?iglice, a pimp.
13 However, the young Chunda was sent to Umritsir, where
14 she remained for four or five years in the house of Jewahir
15 Mull. There she might have remained in quiet much longer,
16 her guardian receiving for her maintenance forty-five rupees
17 a month — but that she had even at so early an age won for
18 herself a character for pertness, forwardness, and something-
19 even worse. So loose and immodest was her conduct that
20 Jewahir Mull, fearing perhaps that the contagion of her vices
21 might spread to the members of his own virtuous family, inform-
22 ed the Maharajh that he could not allow the young Chunda
23 to remain in his house any longer. As a reason for praying to
24 be released of his charge, he represented, that though the girl
25 was then only thirteen or fourteen years of age, she was in
26 criminal intercourse not only with one Jewahir Sing Bussthenee,
27 whose house adjoined his own, but that she had more than
28 one paramour in the very bazars of Umritsir. This Jewahir
29 Sing Bussthenee, a young man and a servant of the Maha-
30 rajh, when questioned on the matter, candidly confessed all, and
31 that to Runjeet Sing himself. The old monarch was well
32 pleased to have such disclosures made in the presence of
33 the girl's father, Munnoo Sing, whose confusion he enjoyed.
34 Moreover, anticipating considerable amusement from that pert-