CHAPTER 4

Attack by Akbar,A.D.1558-62.—Maldeo was destined to outlive the Shershahi dynasty, and to see the imperial crown of India once more encircle the brows of the fugitive Humayun.[17]It had[28] been well for the Rathors had his years been lengthened; for his mild disposition and natural indolence of character gave them some chance that these qualities would be their best advocate. But he did not long survive the restoration. Whether the mother of his successor, prince Akbar, not yet fifteen, stimulated by the recollection of her misfortunes, nursed his young animosity against Maldeo for the miseries of Umarkot, or, whether it was merely an act of cautionary policy to curb the Rajput power, which was inconsistent with his own, in S. 1617 (A.D.1561) he invaded Marwar, and laid siege to Malakot or Merta, which he took after an obstinate and sanguinary defence, part of the garrison cutting their way through his host, and making good their retreat to their prince.[18]The important castle of Nagor was also captured; and both these strongholds and their lands were conferred by Akbar on the younger branch of the family, Rae Singh, prince of Bikaner, now established in independence of the parent State, Jodhpur.

In 1625 (A.D.1569), Maldeo succumbed to necessity; and in conformity with the times, sent his second son, Chandarsen,[19]with gifts to Akbar, then at Ajmer, which had become an integral part of the monarchy; but Akbar was so dissatisfied with the disdainful bearing of the desert king, who refused personally to pay his court, that he not only guaranteed the free possession of Bikaner to Rae Singh, but presented him with the farman for Jodhpur itself, with supremacy over his race. Chandarsen appears to have possessed all the native pride of the Rathor, and to have been prepared to contest his country’s independence, in spite of Akbar and the claims of his elder brother, Udai Singh, who eventually was more supple in ingratiating himself into the monarch’s favour. At the close of life the old Rao had to stand a siege in his capital, and after a brave but fruitless resistance,[20]was obliged to yield homage, and pay it in the person of his sonUdai Singh, who, attending with a contingent, was enrolled amongst the commanders of ‘one thousand’; and shortly after was invested with the title of Mota Raja, or ‘the fat Raja,’ by which epithet alone he is designated in the annals of that period.[21]

Chandarsen, with a considerable number of the brave vassals of Maru, determined to cling to independence and the rude fare of the desert, rather than servilely follow in the train of the despot. When driven from Jodhpur, they took post in Siwana, in the western extremity of the State, and there held out to the death. For seventeen years he maintained his title to thegaddi, and divided the allegiance of [29] the Rathors with his elder brother Udai Singh (though supported by the king), and stood the storm in which he nobly fell, leaving three sons, Ugarsen, Askaran, and Rao Singh, who fought a duel with Rao Surthan, of Sirohi, and was slain, with twenty-four of his chiefs,[22]near the town of Datani.

Maldeo, though he submitted to acknowledge the supremacy of the emperor, was at least spared the degradation of seeing a daughter of his blood bestowed upon the opponent of his faith; he died soon after the title was conferred on his son, which sealed the dependence of Maru. His latter days were a dismal contrast to those which witnessed his conquests in almost everypart of Rajputanapart of Rajputana, but he departed from this world in time to preserve his own honour untarnished, with the character of the most valiant and energetic Rajput of his time. Could he have added to his years and maintained their ancient vigour, he might, by a junction with Partap of Mewar, who single-handed commenced his career just as Maldeo’s closed, have maintained Rajput independence against the rising power of the Moguls.[23]

Maldeo, who died S. 1625 (A.D.1569), had twelve sons:

1. [The Vanaprastha or anchorite stage (āsrama) of a Brāhman’s life (Manu,Laws, vi. 1 ff.).]

2. We have seen one of these objects, self-condemned never to lie down during forty years, and there remained but three to complete the term. He had travelled much, was intelligent and learned; but far from having contracted the moroseness of the recluse, there was a benignity of mien, and a suavity and simplicity of manner in him, quite enchanting. He talked of his penance with no vainglory, and of its approaching term without any sensation. The resting position of this Druid (vanaprastha) was by means of a rope suspended from the bough of a tree, in the manner of a swing, having a cross-bar, on which he reclined. The first years of this penance, he says, were dreadfully painful; swollen limbs affected him to that degree, that he expected death; but this impression had long since worn off.“Even“Evenin this, is there much vanity,” and it would be a nice point to determine whether the homage of man or the approbation of the Divinity most sustains the energies under such appalling discipline.

3. Pali did not remain to Siahji’s descendants, when they went westward and settled on the Luni: the Sesodias took it with other lands from the Parihar of Mandor. It was the feud already adverted to with Mewar which obtained for him the fertile districts of Pali and Sojat, by which his territories at length touched the Aravalli, and the fears of the assassin of Rana Kumbha made his parricidal son relinquish the provinces of Sambhar and Ajmer (see Vol. I. p.339).

4. [Now in ruins, about 85 miles N.W. of Jodhpur city, containing a large Jain temple and monuments of the Chief’s family.]

5. See Vol. I. p.337.

6. See p.842.

7. [The present area of Mārwār is 34,963 square miles; population 2,057,776, of which Rājputs form 27·9 per cent.]

8. Siahji is the Bhakha for Siva;—thejiis merely an adjunct of respect.

9. One of the chronicles makes Satal occupy thegaddiafter Jodha, during three years; but this appears a mistake—he was killed in defending Satalmer.

10. For a description of this festival see p.675.

11. The Yati’s roll says Ganga was poisoned; but this is not confirmed by any other authority.

12. [The dates are doubtful. See the legend of the marriage of Rāo Māldeo to Uma, daughter of the Bhatti Chief of Jaisalmer (IA, iii. 96 ff.).]

13. [“The most powerful of the Hindu princes who still retained their independence,” trans. Briggs, ii. 121.]

14. Mr. Elphinstone apprehended an attack from the Maldots on his way to Kabul.

15. Such is the Rajput’s notion ofswamidharma, or “fidelity to him whose salt they eat,” their immediate lord, even against their king.

16. In allusion to the poverty of the soil, as unfitted to produce richer grains [Ferishta ii. 123; see pp.835,931above].

17. There is a biographical account of this monarch, during his exile in Persia, written by his Abdar, or ‘cup-bearer,’ in the library of Major W. Yule, of Edinburgh, and which, when translated, will complete the series of biography of the members of the house of Timur. [TheTazkirātu-l-wāki‘ātof Jauhar, extracts from which are translated in Elliot-Dowson v. 136 ff.]

18. [The capture of Merta in 1562 by Sharafu-dīn Husain Mirza is described inAkbarnāma, trans. H. Beveridge, ii. 247 f.; Smith,Akbar, 59.]

19. [The statement that Chandarsen was second son of Māldeo rests on the Author’s account, and is not mentioned in theAkbarnāma.]

20. [For the capture of Jodhpur, “the strongest fort in that country,” by Husain Kuli Khān seeAkbarnāma, ii. 305.]

21. [SeeĀīn, i. 429 f. Erskine (iii. A. 587) suggests that Mota means ‘good, potent’.]

22. It was fought with a certain number on each side, Rathors against Deoras, a branch of the Chauhans, the two bravest of all the Rajput races. It reminds us of some of the duels related by Froissart.

23. See Vol. I.385ff.

Vassalage of Mārwār to the Mughals.—The death of Maldeo formed an important epoch in the annals of the Rathors. Up to this period the will had waited upon the wish of the gallant descendants of Siva; but now the vassals of Maru acknowledged one mightier than they. The banner of the empire floated pre-eminent over thepanchranga, the five-coloured flag, which had led the Rathors from victory to victory, and waved from the sandhills of Umarkot to the salt-lake of Sambhar; from the desert bordering the Gara to the peaks of the Aravalli. Henceforward, the Rathor princes had, by their actions or subservience, to ascend by degrees the steps to royal favour. They were required to maintain a contingent of their proud vassals, headed by the heir, to serve at the Mogul’s pleasure. Their deeds won them, not ignobly, the grace of the imperial court; but had slavish submission been the sole path to elevation, the Rathor princes would never have attained a grade beyond the first mansab,[1]conferred on Udai Singh. Yet though streams of wealth enriched the barren plains of Maru; although a portion of the spoils of Golkonda and Bijapur augmented its treasures, decorated its palaces, and embellished its edifices and mausoleums; although the desert kings took the ‘right hand’ of all the feudality ofHind, whether indigenous or foreign—a feudal assemblage of no less than seventy-six petty kingdoms—yet the Rathor felt the sense of his now degraded condition, and it often burst forth even in the presence of the suzerain.

Rāo Udai Singh,A.D.1581-95.—Maldeo’s death occurred in S. 1625;[2]but the chronicles do not admit of Udai [31] Singh’s elevation until the death of his brother Chandarsen, from which period we may reckon that he was, though junior, the choice both of his father and the nobles, who did not approve of Udai Singh’s submission to Akbar. In fact, the Raja led the royal forces against the most powerful of his vassals, and resumed almost all the possessions of the Mertias, and weakened the others.

Before we proceed to trace the course pursued by Udai Singh, who was seated upon the cushion of Maldeo in S. 1640 (A.D.1584), let us cast a short retrospect over the annals of Maru, since the migration of the grandson of the potentate of Kanauj, which, compared with the ample page of western history, present little more than a chronicle of hard names, though not destitute of facts interesting to political science.

Retrospect of Mārwār History.—In the table before the reader, aided by the explanations in the text, he will see the whole process of the conquest, peopling, and settlement of an extensive region, with its partition or allotments amongst an innumerable frèrage (bhayyad), whose children continue to hold them as vassals of their king and brother, the descendant of their mutual ancestor Siahji.

We may divide the annals of Marwar, from the migration of Siahji from Kanauj to the accession of Udai Singh, into three distinct epochs:

1. From the settlement of Siahji in the land of Kher, inA.D.1212, to the conquest of Mandor by Chonda, inA.D.1381.

2. From the conquest of Mandor to the founding of Jodhpur, inA.D.1459; and

3. From the founding of Jodhpur to the accession of Udai Singh inA.D.1584, when the Rathors acknowledged the supremacy of the empire.

The two first epochs were occupied in the subjugation of the western portion of the desert from the ancient allodiality; norwas it until Chonda conquered Mandor, on the decline of the Chauhans of the east, that the fertile lands on either side of the Luni were formed into fiefs for the children of Ranmall and Jodha. A change of capital with the Rajput is always productive of change in the internal organisation of the State; and not unfrequently the race changes its appellation with its capital. The foundation of Jodhpur was a new era, and henceforth the throne of Maru could only be occupied by the tribe of Jodha, and from branches not constituting the vassals of the crown, who were cut off from succession. This is a peculiar [32] feature in Rajput policy, and is common to the whole race, as will be hereafter more distinctly pointed out in the annals of Ajmer.

Feudalism in Mārwār.—Jodha, with all the ambition of the founder of a State, gave a new form to the feudal institutions of his country. Necessity, combined with pride, led him to promulgate a statute of limitation of the sub-infeudations of Maru. The immense progeny of his father Ranmall, twenty-four sons, and his own, of fourteen, almost all of whom had numerous issue, rendered it requisite to fix the number and extent of the fiefs; and amongst them, henceforward constituting permanently the frèrage of Maru, the lands were partitioned, Kandhal having emigrated and established his own numerous issue, the Kandhalots, in Bikaner. The two brothers next to Jodha, namely, Champa and Kumpa, with his two sons, Duda and Karamsi, and his grandson, Uda, were declared the heads of the feudal association under their names, the Champawats, Kumpawats, Mertias (sons of Duda), Karamsots, and Udawats, and continue to be “the pillars of Maru.” Eight great estates, called theath thakurat, or ‘eight lordships’ of Marwar, each of the nominal annual value of fifty thousand rupees (£5000), were settled on these persons, and their immense influence has obtained many others for younger branches of their clans. The title of the first noble of Maru was given to Champa and his issue, who have often made its princes tremble on their thrones. Besides these, inferior appanages were settled on the junior branches, brothers, sons, and grandsons of Jodha, which were also deemed hereditary and irresumable; to use their own phrase, theirbat,[3]or ‘allotment,’ to which they consider their title as sacred as that of their princeto his throne, of whom they say, “When our services are acceptable, then is he our lord; when not, we are again his brothers and kin, claimants, and laying claim to the land.”[4]

Rao Maldeo confirmed this division of Jodha, though he increased the secondary fiefs, and as the boundaries of Marwar were completed in his reign, it was essentially necessary to confirm the limitation. The feudal States of Marwar are, therefore, perpetuated in the offspring of the princes from Jodha to Maldeo, and a distinction exists between them and those subsequently conferred; the first, being [33] obtained by conquest, are deemed irrevocable, and must be perpetuated by adoption on the failure of lineal issue; whereas the other may, on lapses, be resumed and added to the fisc whence it emanated. The fiscal domain of the Rajput princes cannot, says their traditionary lore, be alienated for more than a life-interest; but this wise rule, though visible in anecdotes of past days, has been infringed with their general disorganization. These instances, it may be asserted, afford the distinctions of allodial and feudal lands. Of the numerous clans, the issue of Siahji to Jodha, which are spread over the northern and western parts of the State, some, partly from the difficulty of their position, partly from a feeling of respect to their remote ancestry, enjoy almost entire independence. Yet they recognize the prince of Maru as their liege lord when his crown is endangered, and render homage on his accession or any great family event. These clans hold without grant or fine, and may properly be called the allodial chieftains. Of this number we may enumerate the lordships of Barmer, Kotra, Sheo, Phulsund, etc. Others there are who, though less independent, may also be styled the allodiality of Marwar, who are to furnish their quotas when demanded, and perform personal homage on all great days of rejoicing; of these are Mewa, Sindari, etc. The ancient clans scattered over the land, or serving the more modern chieftains, are recognized by their patronymic distinctions, by those versed in the chronicles; though many hear the names of Duharka, Mangalia, Uhar, and Dhandal, without knowing them to be Rathor. The mystic page of the bard is always consulted previous to any marriage, in order to prevent a violation of the matrimonial canons of the Rajputs, which are stricter than the Mosaic, and this keeps up the knowledgeof the various branches of their own and other races, which would otherwiseperish.perish.

Whatever term may be applied to these institutions of a martial race, and which for the sake of being more readily understood we have elsewhere called, and shall continue to designate, “feudal,” we have not a shadow of doubt that they were common to the Rajput races from the remotest ages, and that Siahji conveyed them from the seat of his ancestors, Kanauj. A finer picture does not exist of the splendour of a feudal array than the camp of its last monarch, Jaichand, in the contest with the Chauhan. The annals of each and every State bear evidence to a system strictly parallel to that of Europe; more especially Mewar, where, thirteen hundred years ago, we see the entire feudatories of the State throwing up their grants, giving their liege lord defiance, and threatening him with their [34] vengeance. Yet, having “eaten his salt,” they forbore to proceed to hostilities till a whole year had elapsed, at the expiration of which they deposed him.[5]Akbar, who was partial to Hindu institutions, borrowed much from them, in all that concerned his own regulations.

In contrasting these customs with analogous ones in the West, the reader should never lose sight of one point, which must influence the analogy, namely, the patriarchal form which characterizes the feudal system in all countries; and as, amongst the Rajputs, all their vassalage is of their own kin and blood (save a slight mixture of foreign nobles as a counterpoise), the paternity of the sovereign is no fiction, as in Europe; so that from the son of Champa, who takes the right hand of his prince, to the meanest vassal, who serves merely for hispeti[6](rations), all are linked by the tie of consanguinity, of which it is difficult to say whether it is most productive of evil or good, since it has afforded examples as brilliant and as dark as any in the history of mankind. The devotion which made twelve thousand, out of the fifty thousand, “sons of Jodha” prove their fidelity to Maldeo has often been emulated even to the present day.

The chronicles, as before stated, are at variance with regard to the accession of Udai Singh: some date it from the death of Maldeo, in S. 1625 (A.D.1569); others from that of his elder brother Chandarsen, slain in the storm of Siwana. The name ofUdai appears one of evil portent in the annals of Rajasthan.[7]While “Udai, the fat,” was inhaling the breeze of imperial power, which spread a haze of prosperity over Maru, Partap of Mewar, the idol of the Rajputs, was enduring every hardship in the attempt to work out his country’s independence, which had been sacrificed by his father, Udai Singh. In this he failed, but he left a name hallowed in the hearts of his countrymen, and immortalized in the imperishable verse of the bard.

On the union of the imperial house with that of Jodhpur, by the marriage of Jodh Bai to Akbar,[8]the emperor not only restored all the possessions he had wrested from Marwar, with the exception of Ajmer, but several rich districts in Malwa, whose revenues doubled the resources of his own fiscal domain. With the aid of his imperial brother-in-law, he greatly diminished the power of the feudal aristocracy [35], and clipped the wings of almost all the greater vassals, while he made numerous sequestrations of the lands of the ancient allodiality and lesser vassals; so that it is stated, that, either by new settlement or confiscation, he added fourteen hundred villages to the fisc. He resumed almost all the lands of the sons of Duda, who, from their abode, were termed Mertia; took Jaitaran from the Udawats, and other towns of less note from the sons of Champa and Kumpa.

Udai Singh was not ungrateful for the favours heaped upon him by the emperor, for whom his Rathors performed many signal services: for the raja was latterly too unwieldy for any steed to bear him to battle. The “king of the Desert” (the familiar epithet applied to him by Akbar) had a numerous progeny; no less than thirty-four legitimate sons and daughters, who added new clans and new estates to the feudal association of Maru: of these the most conspicuous are Govindgarh and Pisangan; while some obtained settlements beyond its limits which became independent and bear the name of the founders. Of these are Kishangarh and Ratlam in Malwa.

Death of Rāo Udai Singh.—Udai Singh died thirteen years after his inauguration on the cushion of Jodha, and thirty-threeafter the death of Maldeo. The manner of his death, as related in the biographical sketches termed Khyat, affords such a specimen of superstition and of Rajput manners that it would be improper to omit it. The narrative is preceded by some reflections on the moral education of the Rathor princes, and the wise restraints imposed upon them under the vigilant control of chiefs of approved worth and fidelity; so that, to use the words of the text, “they often passed their twentieth year, ignorant of woman.” If the “fat raja” had ever known this moral restraint, in his riper years he forgot it; for although he had no less than twenty-seven queens, he cast the eye of desire on the virgin-daughter of a subject, and that subject a Brahman.

Brāhman sacrifices his Daughter.—It was on the raja’s return from court to his native land that he beheld the damsel, and he determined, notwithstanding the sacred character of her father and his own obligations as the dispenser of law and justice, to enjoy the object of his admiration. The Brahman was an Ayapanthi,[9]or votary of Ayamata, whose shrine is at Bhavi-Bhilara. These sectarians of Maru, very different from the abstinent Brahmans of Bengal, eat flesh, drink wine, and share in all the common enjoyments of life with the martial spirits around them. Whether the scruples of the [36] daughter were likely to be easily overcome by her royal tempter, or whether the raja threatened force, the Khyat does not inform us; but as there was no other course by which the father could save her from pollution but by her death, he resolved to make it one of vengeance and horror. He dug a sacrificial pit, and having slain his daughter, cut her into fragments, and mingling therewith pieces of flesh from his own person, made the Homa, or burnt sacrifice to Ayamata, and as the smoke and flames ascended he pronounced an imprecation on the raja: “Let peace be a stranger to him! and in three pahars,[10]three days, and three years, let me have revenge!” Then exclaiming, “My future dwelling is the Dabhi Baori!” sprung into the flaming pit. The horrid tale was related to the raja, whose imagination was haunted by the shade of the Brahman;and he expired at the assigned period, a prey to unceasing remorse.

Superstition is sometimes made available for moral ends; and the shade of the Ayapanthi Brahman of Bhilara has been evoked, in subsequent ages, to restrain and lead unto virtue libidinous princes, when all other control has been unavailing. The celebrated Jaswant Singh, the great-grandson of Udai, had an amour with the daughter of one of his civil officers, and which he carried on at the Dabhi Baori.[11]But the avenging ghost of the Brahman interposed between him and his wishes. A dreadful struggle ensued, in which Jaswant lost his senses, and no effort could banish the impression from his mind. The ghost persecuted his fancy, and he was generally believed to be possessed with a wicked spirit, which, when exorcised, was made to say he would only depart on the self-sacrifice of a chief equal in dignity to Jaswant. Nahar Khan, “the tiger lord,” chief of the Kumpawat clan, who led the van in all his battles, immediately offered his head in expiation for his prince; and he had no sooner expressed this loyal determination, than the holy men who exorcised the spirit caused it to descend into a vessel of water, and having waved it thrice round his head, they presented it to Nahar Khan, who drank it off, and Jaswant’s senses were instantly restored. This miraculous transfer of the ghost is implicitly believed by every chief of Rajasthan, by whom Nahar was called “the faithful of the faithful.” Previous to dying, he called his son, and imposed on him and his descendants, by the solemnity of an oath, the abjuration of the office of Pardhan, or hereditary premier of Marwar, whose dignity involved such a sacrifice [37]; and from that day the Champawats of Awa succeeded the Kumpawats of Asop, who renounced the first seat on the right for that on the left of their princes.

We shall conclude the reign of Udai Singh with the register of his issue from “the Book of Kings.” It is by no means an unimportant document to such as are interested in these singular communities, and essentially useful to those who are called uponto interfere in their national concerns. Here we see the affinities of the branch (sakha) to the parent tree, which in one short century has shaded the whole land; and to which the independents of Kishangarh, Rupnagarh, and Ratlam, as well as the feudal chiefs of Govindgarh, Khairwa, and Pisangan, all issues from Udai Singh, look for protection.

Issue of Raja Udai Singh:—

And seventeen daughters not registered in the chronicle [38].

1. [Rank, prescribing precedence and gradation of pay (Irvine,Army of the Indian Moghuls, 3 ff.).]

2. [The dates are uncertain; those in the margin follow Erskine (iii. B. 25).]

3. Frombatna, ‘to divide, to partition.’

4. See the remonstrance of the vassal descendants of these chiefs, expelled their patrimony by their prince, to the English enemy, Vol. I. p.230.

5. See Vol. I. p.266.

6. Literally, ‘a bellyful.’

7. Instead of being, as it imports, the ‘ascending,’ (Skt.udaya), it should for ever, in both the houses of Maru and Mewar, signify ‘setting’; the pusillanimity of the one sunk Mewar, that of the other Marwar.

8. [There has been some controversy about Jodh Bāī, but it is clear that she was wife of Jahāngīr, not of Akbar (Āīn, i. 619).]

9. [This is one of the Jogi orders (Rose,Glossary, ii. 9). The Author (Western India, 136) says that Ayāmāta is tutelary goddess of the Koli tribe. One branch of the Lohānas specially worship her (Census Report, Mārwār, 1891, ii. 139).]

10. A pahar is a watch of the day, about three hours.

11. A reservoir excavated by one of the Dabhi tribe. [This is a mistake. The proper name is Tāpi Bāori or ‘pit of fire’ (Census Report, Mārwār, 1891, ii. 65). For similar ghost stories see Crooke,Popular Religion and Folklore of N. India, i. 193 ff. The original name of Nāhar Khān, before his conversion to Islām, was Mukunddās.]

12. Ratlam, Kishangarh, and Rupnagarh are independent, and all under the separate protection of the British Government.

CHAPTER 5

Rāja Sūr Singh,A.D.1595-1620.—Sur Singh succeeded in S. 1651 (A.D.1595). He was serving with the Imperial forces at Lahore, where he had commanded since S. 1648, when intelligence reached him of his father’s death. His exploits and services were of the most brilliant nature, and had obtained for him, even during his father’s life, the title of “Sawai Raja,”[1]and a high grade amongst the dignitaries of the empire. He was commanded by Akbar to reduce the arrogant prince of Sirohi, who, trusting to the natural strength of his mountainous country, still refused to acknowledge a liege lord. This service well accorded with his private views, for he had a feud (wair) with Rao Surthan, which, according to the chronicle, he completely revenged. “He avenged his feud with Surthan and plundered Sirohi. The Rao had not a pallet left to sleep upon, but was obliged to make a bed for his wives upon the earth.” This appears to have humbled the Deora, “who, in his pride, shot his arrows at the sun for daring to shine upon him.”

Campaign in Gujarāt.—Surthan accepted the imperial [39] farman in token of submission, and agreed to serve with a contingent of his hardy clansmen in the war then entrusted to Raja Sur against the king of Gujarat, whose success we shall relate in the simple language of the chronicle: “The Raja took thepanagainst the king Muzaffar, with the title of viceroy of Gujarat. The armies met at Dhandhuka,[2]where a terrible conflict ensued. The Rathors lost many valiant men, but the Shah was defeated, and lost all the insignia of his greatness. He sent the spoil of seventeen thousand towns to the king, but kept a crore ofdrabs[3]for himself, which he sent to Jodhpur, and therewith he enlarged the town and fort. For this service Akbar increased hismansab, and sent him a sword, with a khilat, and a grant of fresh lands.”

Raja Sur, it appears in the sequel, provided liberally for the bards; for no less than “six lords of verse,” whose names are given, had in gift £10,000 each of the spoils of Gujarat, as incentives to song.

On the conquest of Gujarat, Raja Sur was ordered to the Deccan. “He obeyed, and with thirteen thousand horse, ten large guns, and twenty elephants, he fought three grand battles. On the Rewa (Nerbudda) he attacked Amra Balecha,[4]who had five thousand horse, whom he slew, and reduced all his country. For this service the king sent him anaubat(kettle-drum), and conferred on him Dhar and its domain.”

On Akbar’s death and the accession of Jahangir, Sur Singh attended at court with his son and heir, Gaj Singh, whom the king with his own hands invested with the sword, for his bravery in the escalade of Jalor, which had been conquered by the monarch of Gujarat and added to his domain. The poet thus relates the event: “Gaj[5]was commanded against Bihari Pathan; his war-trump sounded; Arbuda [Abu] heard and trembled. What took Alau-d-din years, Gaj accomplished in three months; he escaladed Jalandhara[6]sword in hand; many a Rathor of fame was killed, but he put to the sword seven thousand Pathans, whose spoils were sent to the king.”

Raja Sur, it would appear, after the overthrow of the dynasty of Gujarat, remained at the capital, while his son and heir, Gaj Singh, attended the king’s [40] commands, and, soon after the taking of Jalor, was ordered with the Marwar contingent against Rana Amra of Mewar: it was at the very moment of its expiring liberties,[7]for the chronicle merely adds, “Karan agreed to serve the king, and Gaj Singh returned to Taragarh.[8]The king increased both his ownmansab(dignity) and that of his father, Raja Sur.”

Thus the Rajput chronicler, solicitous only to record the fame of his own princes, does not deem it necessary to concern himselfwith the agents conjoined with them, so that a stranger to the events of the period would imagine, from the high relief given to their actions, that the Rathor princes commanded in all the great events described; for instance, that just mentioned, involving the submission of the Rana, when Raja Gaj was merely one of the great leaders who accompanied the Mogul heir-apparent, Prince Khurram, on this memorable occasion. In the Diary of Jahangir, the emperor, recording this event, does not even mention the Rathor prince, though he does those of Kotah and Datia, as the instruments by which Prince Khurram carried on the negotiation;[9]from which we conclude that Raja Gaj merely acted a military part in the grand army which then invaded Mewar.

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