Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c53.s2.6

v4.c53.s2.6

"The Maratha State . . . is but ill-qualified for permanent conquest or civil government, however formidable may be the means which it possesses of ravage and devastation. The whole country under its subjection from the Chambal to the Ganges is in the most miserable state of neglect and disorder, the lands deserted and the cultivation so scanty as scarcely to supply subsistence to the remaining inhabitants, the roads infested with numerous bands of robbers, . . . particularly in the neighbourhood of Delhi, where they are so formidable as to set the forces of the Government at defiance.