Published: Civil and Military Gazette, 26 July 1887.

Attribution: In Scrapbook 3 (28/3, p. 5).

Text: Civil and Military Gazette.

Note: Unrecorded and unreprinted. For the series of ‘Smith’ stories, see the headnote to ‘The Case of Adamah’.

The following is the letter of the Chief Secretary of the * * * Government to the Commissioner of the __________ Division; conveying the orders of the Government upon the action of Mr. Skrewson:–

(1). It appears from the reports and records now submitted, that there is a large loose-box (or enclosure, surrounded on three sides with mud walls, and on the fourth with bails or wooden bars) in the Chorpur Sub-Division, the property of one Smith, a European. In the enclosure (or loose box) was occasionally to be found a ghoont (or horse of Himalayan extraction) assessed by the Municipality under the by-laws which provided for the taxation of horses and vehicles. It is noteworthy, as showing the extreme perversity of the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of Chorpur, in the prejudiced view of that animal taken from the outset, that Smith, owner of the enclosure or loose-box, had frequently, in the hearing of witnesses whose evidence has been commented on by Sir Homer Botheram, declared the ghoont or Himalayan horse to be a “wild beast.” J. Tompkins, C.E., also a European, whose evidence would naturally lean to the defence of his fellow-countryman, stated before the magistrate on oath that Smith had, on several occasions, asserted openly that the ghoont was “the wildest beast he knew.”

(2). The night of February 11th, 1887, Smith received information from Balloo, sais, that in the course of the past ten days, four horses had been taken out of their enclosures on the grounds of two English persons by some native gentlemen in pursuance of the immemorial custom set forth in the ancient Sanskrit proverb which says:– “Finding's keeping, losing's seeking.” The records of the Chorpur Sub-Division show that horses, which include ghoonts, were annually removed from their enclosures by native gentlemen in the months of February and March.