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HISTORY OF TPIE INDIAN NAVY. 281
'Aurora,' in company with which the corvette continued
the cruise. While thus engaged he was instrumental in saving
treasure amounting to sixty bags of dollars, and the greater
part of the cargo of a vessel, formerly known as the ' l*rincess
Royal,' belonging to some of the principal merchants of Surat,
which had been wrecked on the Kattywar coast ; for this act,
the merchants, upwards of twenty in number, and the under-
writers, presented him with a letter of thanks, and he received
from the Governor in Council, a despatch conveying his " high
approval" for his meritorious conduct, and his huuianity in pre-
serving the crew from the hands of the " lawless soldiery " of the
Government of Joouughur, who had appropriated the whole of
the valuable cargo, besides forty-two bags of dollars and silver,
in recovering which, says the Political Agent, "Captain Grant,
who had returned to the coast for the express object of pro-
curing restitution, was subjected to personal insult and danger."
In 1820, by an unexpected event, the active career of Captain
Grant was temporarily brought to a sudden termination, and
though he served in India some years after this event, his con-
stitution had received so rude a shock by the cruel ill-treatment
to which he was subjected, that he never recovered his health,
and was ultimately forced to quit the Service, and retire upon a
pension. Captain Grant had been so successful in his vigorous
measures for the extirpation of piracy on the coast of Kattywar,
that the Guicowar considered it unnecessary to maintain a naval
establishment. He, accordingly, received orders to proceed in-
land from his station, Velun Bunder, near Din Head, to Ann-ellie
Fort, to deliver over charge of his vessels to the Guicowar's
Sersooba or Dewan. While proceeding on this journey with
an escort of four moinited men, he was waylaid by a bidm-icutt'ui*
band of thirty-five horsemen, commanded by a noted Kattee
outlaw chief, one Bawawalla, and, after a brief struggle, in which
his servant was killed, and his moonshee and two of his small
escort were wounded, the party were overpowered. Captain
Grant was personally unable to make any efllectual resistance,
as he oidy carried a riding whip, and was carried away to endure
a confinement of nearly three months in the most pestilential
jungles of tlu; Kattywar peninsula.!
* Balia-wuttia means literally " out of countn," and the outlaws, wlio wore
thus termed, were the most cruel of the liumau race, and not only ravaged the
country and robbed all degi-ees of the community, but did not scruple to maim
or murder even those wlio offered no resistance.
t His sufferings were sucli that most men would have succumbed to them, but
he was gifted with an iron frame and indomitable resolution, and snrviveil more
than lialf a century ; in April, 1871, at the request of General 8ir George Lo
G-rand Jacob—wiio had filled the post of Political Agent at Kattywar, between
s\ipplied liim with the following " Narrative of bis Cap-
tivity," whieli appears in that ollicer's work, entitled " Western India :"— " On
the years lS;51)-43—be
first coming up, 15awawalla said that ho wanted to consult me about his alfairs,
and on this pretext got me to dismount ; my people being rendered helpless, I