'Travels in Beloochistan and Sinde; accompanied by a geographical and historical account of those countries, with a map.' [‎399] (441/476)

HISTORY OF SINDE. 399
possession of the government and revenues, which latter enabled
them to collect a force very superior in number to the Uffghans,
whom they totally defeated at the village of Jeeund, twenty kos
south-west ol the city of Shikarpoor, to which the discomfited
troops fled. A negociation was then set on foot, and the Talpoories
proposing to discharge all arrears of tribute, as well as to be most
punctual in the payment of it thenceforward, the matter was ami
cably adjusted between them and the King, by the latter issuing a
furman, appointing Meer Futtuh Allee, the eldest of four brothers,
to the government, and declaring all subjects of Sinde free from
their allegiance to the Kulora family, of whom there now remains
one chief, wKo escaped to Guzeratte, where he was, within these
few years, a soldier of fortune in the service of one of the native
princes.
A little more than three years subsequent to this arrangement, the
Talpooree Umeers positively declined paying a single rupee of
tribute, and Tymoor Shah could not then spare troops to awe them
into obedience ; his son Zeman Shah, who succeeded him in 1793,
advanced to their frontier the following year, but not being willing
to lose time in a protracted warfare, he accepted twenty-four lacs One lakh is equal to one hundred thousand rupees of
rupees Indian silver coin also widely used in the Persian Gulf. % which was not one-fourth of the amount due; and marched
back to his own dominions. This impolitic compromise opened the
eyes ol the Sindians to their own strength and importance, and they
have never since spoken of the tribute as any thing more than no
minal, though in 1805, when Shah Shooja Ool Moolk, moved to
enforce it, they deputed Wulee Mohummud Khan to meet him on
the confines of their territories, and he had sufficient address to
prevail on the King* to return, contrary to the strenuous advice of one
of his ministers, Futtuh Khan, on receiving twenty-seven lacs One lakh is equal to one hundred thousand rupees of
rupees Indian silver coin also widely used in the Persian Gulf. in lieu of seventy-onef ? that were then unpaid.
* 300,0001. sterling.
f 337,5001. sterling, instead of 887,5001. sterling.