Confessions of a Thug

First published in 1839, this novel is framed as the confession of Ameer Ali, a Thug, to a British officer in India. Ali recounts his childhood among the stranglers who robbed travellers in the name of the goddess they serve, his rise as a leader of gangs on the Deccan roads, and the murders carried out with the rumal. He describes recruitment, omens, the division of spoil, and the British campaign that finally breaks the bands. The narrative mixes adventure with a documentary tone drawn from years in the Nizam's territories. It is a first-person criminal memoir in fiction, not a later history of Thuggee.

Bound in yellow-brown cloth with a wrap-around frieze design in dark green by Hutton. Map endleaves printed cream on dark green. Yellow-brown textured slipcase.