1 280 DISCONTENT OF THE MAHOMEDANS.
2 The Mussulmans hate the Sikh rule, and.
3 every one of them who came to our camp in-
4 quired’ whether Peshawr would not also be re-
5 stored to Shah Shuja. They seemed to wish
6 for the restoration of the Shah or to come
7 under the British rule. They prefer the
8 English to the Sikhs, and entertain less re-
9 it has been deemed necessary to erect in the environs of
10 the city. These are constructed of sufficient size to
11 accommodate some five or six malefactors at a time; and
12 after they have suffered the extreme penalty of the law,
13 their bodies, instead of being cut down or removed, are
14 allowed to remain on the gibbets until they either drop to .
15 pieces or are ransomed by their friends. The number of
16 corpses, stiffened into the attitudes they assumed when
17 convulsed with the last agonies of death, or suspended (as
18 some are) by the feet, that are thus presented to the gaze
19 of a stranger, renders a visit to the suburbs of Peshawr
20 far from agreeable: but disgusting as these exhibitions are,
21 it is to be feared that, without them, there would be safety
22 neither for life nor property. Indeed, the benefit of this
23 terrible severity is already being felt, as the unruly tribes
24 under the governor's control are becoming sensible of the
25 necessity of either subduing their evil passions, or of suf-
26 fering the punishment that they now see will certainly
27 follow the commission of crime; and the monthly average
28 number of murdered victims, though still numerous, is no-
29 thing to what it was a few years back.