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reckoned with when self-seeking men and intri-
guers round the Minister were busy devising
means to make the Nizam unpopular. This gave
him a high place in the esteem of the people of
Hyderabad.
Major Neville
Major Neville, Commander of the Nizam's
Regular Forces from the time of Sir Salar Jung I
down to the year 1897, was said to be distantly
connected with the great family of the Nevilles—
the Earls of Warwick. He represented a distinct
type : somewhat reserved and aloof—perhaps with
a natural English aloofness, but he was in sympa-
thy with the people and the place where his work
lay. An elderly person with whitish Dundreary
whiskers, he was seen of an evening with Mrs.
Neville by his side, driving his phaeton from
his house near Fat eh Maidan towards the Bund.
The picture is still in my mind, of the pair in the
phaeton and of the tall, large limbed white-spotted
chestnut horse drawing it. It was a sight we were
sorry to miss when the Nevilles died (husband and
wife within a week or so of each other) in 1897.
Mrs. Neville was a daughter of no less famous a
person than Charles Lever, the novelist. Hers
was a tall, broad, heavy figure which almost
eclipsed her husband's and she impressed people
as being remarkably masculine in her ways. It
was whispered that she was fond of a cigar ! I
never saw her with one—but I often saw her
striding along a raised platform adjoining one.