A history of the Sikhs, from the origin of the nation to the battles of the Sutlej.

ADVERTISEMENT xxi
some tenderness may be shown to individual sensitiveness,
but History, to be of any value, should be written by one
superior to the influences of private or personal feelings.
What Gibbon calls 'truth, naked, unblushing truth, the
first virtue of more serious history', should alone direct
the pen of the historian; and truth alone influenced the
mind and guided the pen of the Author of this book.
PETER CUNNINGHAM.
KENSINGTON,
18th January, 1853.
ministerial stamp forces into currency, defrauding a present generation, and handing down to posterity a chain of dangerous lies.KAYE, Affghanistan, ii. 13.