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Taken from annals and antiquities of rajputana---by Colonel Tod
There arrived at Udaipiir a detachment of the troops
of Jaipur, bringing proposals for the marriage of
their prince with the Rana's daughter. The Jaipur
cortege encamped near the capital, and the Rana's
acknowledgments and acceptance of the proposal
were despatched to Jaipur. But Raja Man of Marwar
also advanced pretensions to the hand of the princess,
on the ground that she had been actually betrothed
to his predecessor. She had been betrothed, he
said, to the throne of Marwar, not to the individual
occupant ; and he vowed resentment and opposition
if his claims were disregarded.
Krishna Kumari was the name of the lovely
object, rivalry for whose hand assembled under the
banners of her admirers, Jaggat Singh of Jaipur
and Raja Man of Marwar, not only their native
chivalry, but all the predatory powers of Hindustan.
Sindhia, having been denied a pecuniary demand
by Jaipur, opposed the nuptials, and aided the claims
of Raja Man by demanding of the Rana the dis-
missal of the Jaipur embassy. This being refused,
he advanced his brigades and batteries ; and, after
repulsing a fruitless resistance, in which the troops
of Jaipur joined, he forced the pass into the valley
of Udaipiir with a corps of 8,000 men, and
encamped within cannon range of the city. The
Rana had no alternative but to dismiss the nuptial
cortege, and agree to whatever was demanded.
Sindhia remained a month in the valley, during
which an interview took place between him and
the Rana at the shrine of Eklinga. To increase
his importance, the Mahratta invited the British
envoy and his staff, who had just arrived at his
camp, to be present on the occasion. The princely
bearing of the Rana and his sons made a great
impression on the visitors, being in marked contrast
to that of the Mahratta and his suite ; 1 while the
regal abode of this ancient race acted with irresistible
force on the cupidity of Sindhia, who aspired to,
yet dared not, seat himself in "the palace of the
Csesars." It was even surmised that his hostility
to Jaipur was not so much from the refused war-
contribution as from a mortifying negative to his
own proposal for the hand of the Mewar princess.
The heralds of Hymen being thus rudely repulsed,
the Jaipur prince prepared to avenge his insulted pride
and disappointed hopes, and, accordingly, arrayed a
force such as had not assembled in Hindustan since
the empire was in its glory. Raja Man eagerly took
up the gauntlet, and headed the " swords of Maru."
But dissension prevailed in Marwar, where rival
claimants for the throne had divided the loyalty of
the clans, introducing there also the influence of
the Mahrattas. The marriage proposals gave the
malcontents an opportunity for displaying their long
curbed resentments, and, following the example of
Mewar, they set up a pretender, whose interests
were eagerly espoused, and whose standard was
erected in the array of Jaipur. A battle was fought
at Parbatsir on the common boundary of the two
states ; but the action was short, for while a heavy
cannonade opened on both sides, the majority of
the Marwar nobles went over to the pretender. Raja
Man turned his poniard against himself, but some
chiefs yet faithful to him wrested the weapon from
his hand, and conveyed him from the field. He
was pursued to his capital, which was invested and
gallantly defended during six months. The town
was at length taken and plundered ; but the castle
of Joda defied every assault, and in time the mighty-
host of Jaipur, which had eaten the country bare for
twenty miles round, began to crumble away : intrigue
spread through its ranks, and the siege ended in
pusillanimity and flight. Jaggat Singh, humbled
and crestfallen, skulked from the desert retreat of
his rival, indebted to a partisan corps for safety
and convoy to his capital, around whose walls the
wretched remnants of his ill - starred troops long
lagged in expectation of pay, while the bones of
their horses whitened the plain on every side.
Raja Man owed his delivery to one of the most
notorious villains that India ever produced, the
Nawab Amir Khan. This man held command of a
brigade of artillery and horse in Jaipur's army, but
in the course of the siege he deserted to the side of
Marwar ; and he now offered, for a specific sum, to
rid the Raja of the pretender and all his associates.
The offer was accepted, and Amir Khan was not long
in laying his plans. Like Judas he kissed whom he
betrayed. He took service with the pretender, and,
at a shrine of a saint of his own faith, exchanged
turbans with his leaders, a ceremony equivalent to
the most solemn oath of friendship. The too
credulous Rajputs celebrated this acquisition to
their party by feasting and revelry ; but in the
midst of dance and song, the tents were cut down,
and the victims, enveloped in their toils, were
slaughtered by the Khan's followers with showers
of grape.
Thus finished the under-plot ; but another, and
more noble, victim was demanded before discomfited
ambition could repose, or the curtain drop on this
eventful drama. Neither party would relinquish his
claim to the fair object of the war ; and it was the
unhallowed suggestion of the same ferocious Khan
that the blood of the princess could alone extinguish
the torch of discord. We need not analyse the
motives that prompted him to this devilish scheme.
He had determined to make himself all-powerful in
Marwar, and the alliance of Raja Man with Mewar
was not calculated to further his object ; nor was he
anxious for a renewal of the war with Jaipur, which
he knew to be inevitable unless the dispute were
settled. Through the medium of the Chondawat,
Ajit, whom a heavy bribe had made his accomplice,
he revealed his design to the Rana, and induced him
to believe that there were but two alternatives to his
daughter's death. Either he must force her, already
promised to the Jaipur prince, into a dishonourable
marriage with Raja Man, or, by refusing to do so,
draw ruin upon himself and his country. The fiat
was passed that Krishna Kumari should die.
Krishna Kumari Bai, the " virgin princess
Krishna," was in her sixteenth year. Her mother
was of the Chawura race, descended from the ancient
kings of Anhulwara. Sprung from the noblest blood
of Hind, Kumari added beauty of face and form to
an engaging demeanour, and was justly celebrated
as "the flower of Rajasthan." When the fatal cup
was presented to her she received it with a smile, at
the same time addressing words of comfort to her
frantic mother; "Why afflict yourself, my mother,
at this shortening of the sorrows of life? I fear not
to die. We are marked out for sacrifice from our
birth ; let me thank my father that I have lived so
long." Three times the nauseating draught failed
in its object. A fourth, a powerful opiate, was
prepared and administered, and " the desires of
barbarity were accomplished. She slept." The
wretched mother did not long survive her child ;
nature was exhausted in the ravings of despair ;
she refused food, and in a few days her remains
followed those of Kumari to the funeral pyre.
Even the Khan, when the instrument of his infamy,
Ajt't, reported the issue, could not conceal his con-
tempt, and tauntingly asked " if this were the boasted
Rajput valour." But a yet sterner rebuke awaited
the dishonoured Chondawat. Four days after the
crime had been committed, Sangram reached the
capital — a man in every respect the reverse of Ajit.
Audaciously brave, the chief of the Suktawats feared
neither the frown of his sovereign nor the sword of
his enemy. Without introduction he made his way
into the presence. "O dastard!" he exclaimed,
"thou hast thrown dust on the Sesodia race; thou
hast defiled by thy sin the blood which has flowed
in purity for a hundred ages. Let no Sesodia ever
hold up his head again ! The line of Bappa Rawul
is at an end. Heaven has ordained this, a signal
for our destruction." Then, turning upon Ajit, who
was present, he continued: "Thou stain on the
Sesodia race, thou impure of Rajput blood, dust
be on thy head as thou hast covered us all with
shame. May you die childless, and your name
die with you."
The traitor to manhood and his sovereign dared
no reply. Sangram died not long afterwards, but
his curse was fulfilled. The Rana had ninety-five
children ; but only one of his sons grew to manhood,
and only two daughters reached the marriageable
age. The latter were united to the princes of
Jaisalmir and Bikanir, in which states the Salic
law precludes all honour through female descent.
With regard to Aji't, the curse was fully accomplished.
Scarcely a month after it was uttered, his wife and
two sons died. The traitor himself wandered from
shrine to shrine performing penance, his beads in
his hand, and Rama ! Rama ! ever on his lips. But
enough of him ! Let us dismiss him with the words
of Sangram, " dust on his head."
http://www.archive.org/stream/todsannalsofraja00todjrich/todsannalsofraja00todjrich_djvu.txt
There arrived at Udaipiir a detachment of the troops
of Jaipur, bringing proposals for the marriage of
their prince with the Rana's daughter. The Jaipur
cortege encamped near the capital, and the Rana's
acknowledgments and acceptance of the proposal
were despatched to Jaipur. But Raja Man of Marwar
also advanced pretensions to the hand of the princess,
on the ground that she had been actually betrothed
to his predecessor. She had been betrothed, he
said, to the throne of Marwar, not to the individual
occupant ; and he vowed resentment and opposition
if his claims were disregarded.
Krishna Kumari was the name of the lovely
object, rivalry for whose hand assembled under the
banners of her admirers, Jaggat Singh of Jaipur
and Raja Man of Marwar, not only their native
chivalry, but all the predatory powers of Hindustan.
Sindhia, having been denied a pecuniary demand
by Jaipur, opposed the nuptials, and aided the claims
of Raja Man by demanding of the Rana the dis-
missal of the Jaipur embassy. This being refused,
he advanced his brigades and batteries ; and, after
repulsing a fruitless resistance, in which the troops
of Jaipur joined, he forced the pass into the valley
of Udaipiir with a corps of 8,000 men, and
encamped within cannon range of the city. The
Rana had no alternative but to dismiss the nuptial
cortege, and agree to whatever was demanded.
Sindhia remained a month in the valley, during
which an interview took place between him and
the Rana at the shrine of Eklinga. To increase
his importance, the Mahratta invited the British
envoy and his staff, who had just arrived at his
camp, to be present on the occasion. The princely
bearing of the Rana and his sons made a great
impression on the visitors, being in marked contrast
to that of the Mahratta and his suite ; 1 while the
regal abode of this ancient race acted with irresistible
force on the cupidity of Sindhia, who aspired to,
yet dared not, seat himself in "the palace of the
Csesars." It was even surmised that his hostility
to Jaipur was not so much from the refused war-
contribution as from a mortifying negative to his
own proposal for the hand of the Mewar princess.
The heralds of Hymen being thus rudely repulsed,
the Jaipur prince prepared to avenge his insulted pride
and disappointed hopes, and, accordingly, arrayed a
force such as had not assembled in Hindustan since
the empire was in its glory. Raja Man eagerly took
up the gauntlet, and headed the " swords of Maru."
But dissension prevailed in Marwar, where rival
claimants for the throne had divided the loyalty of
the clans, introducing there also the influence of
the Mahrattas. The marriage proposals gave the
malcontents an opportunity for displaying their long
curbed resentments, and, following the example of
Mewar, they set up a pretender, whose interests
were eagerly espoused, and whose standard was
erected in the array of Jaipur. A battle was fought
at Parbatsir on the common boundary of the two
states ; but the action was short, for while a heavy
cannonade opened on both sides, the majority of
the Marwar nobles went over to the pretender. Raja
Man turned his poniard against himself, but some
chiefs yet faithful to him wrested the weapon from
his hand, and conveyed him from the field. He
was pursued to his capital, which was invested and
gallantly defended during six months. The town
was at length taken and plundered ; but the castle
of Joda defied every assault, and in time the mighty-
host of Jaipur, which had eaten the country bare for
twenty miles round, began to crumble away : intrigue
spread through its ranks, and the siege ended in
pusillanimity and flight. Jaggat Singh, humbled
and crestfallen, skulked from the desert retreat of
his rival, indebted to a partisan corps for safety
and convoy to his capital, around whose walls the
wretched remnants of his ill - starred troops long
lagged in expectation of pay, while the bones of
their horses whitened the plain on every side.
Raja Man owed his delivery to one of the most
notorious villains that India ever produced, the
Nawab Amir Khan. This man held command of a
brigade of artillery and horse in Jaipur's army, but
in the course of the siege he deserted to the side of
Marwar ; and he now offered, for a specific sum, to
rid the Raja of the pretender and all his associates.
The offer was accepted, and Amir Khan was not long
in laying his plans. Like Judas he kissed whom he
betrayed. He took service with the pretender, and,
at a shrine of a saint of his own faith, exchanged
turbans with his leaders, a ceremony equivalent to
the most solemn oath of friendship. The too
credulous Rajputs celebrated this acquisition to
their party by feasting and revelry ; but in the
midst of dance and song, the tents were cut down,
and the victims, enveloped in their toils, were
slaughtered by the Khan's followers with showers
of grape.
Thus finished the under-plot ; but another, and
more noble, victim was demanded before discomfited
ambition could repose, or the curtain drop on this
eventful drama. Neither party would relinquish his
claim to the fair object of the war ; and it was the
unhallowed suggestion of the same ferocious Khan
that the blood of the princess could alone extinguish
the torch of discord. We need not analyse the
motives that prompted him to this devilish scheme.
He had determined to make himself all-powerful in
Marwar, and the alliance of Raja Man with Mewar
was not calculated to further his object ; nor was he
anxious for a renewal of the war with Jaipur, which
he knew to be inevitable unless the dispute were
settled. Through the medium of the Chondawat,
Ajit, whom a heavy bribe had made his accomplice,
he revealed his design to the Rana, and induced him
to believe that there were but two alternatives to his
daughter's death. Either he must force her, already
promised to the Jaipur prince, into a dishonourable
marriage with Raja Man, or, by refusing to do so,
draw ruin upon himself and his country. The fiat
was passed that Krishna Kumari should die.
Krishna Kumari Bai, the " virgin princess
Krishna," was in her sixteenth year. Her mother
was of the Chawura race, descended from the ancient
kings of Anhulwara. Sprung from the noblest blood
of Hind, Kumari added beauty of face and form to
an engaging demeanour, and was justly celebrated
as "the flower of Rajasthan." When the fatal cup
was presented to her she received it with a smile, at
the same time addressing words of comfort to her
frantic mother; "Why afflict yourself, my mother,
at this shortening of the sorrows of life? I fear not
to die. We are marked out for sacrifice from our
birth ; let me thank my father that I have lived so
long." Three times the nauseating draught failed
in its object. A fourth, a powerful opiate, was
prepared and administered, and " the desires of
barbarity were accomplished. She slept." The
wretched mother did not long survive her child ;
nature was exhausted in the ravings of despair ;
she refused food, and in a few days her remains
followed those of Kumari to the funeral pyre.
Even the Khan, when the instrument of his infamy,
Ajt't, reported the issue, could not conceal his con-
tempt, and tauntingly asked " if this were the boasted
Rajput valour." But a yet sterner rebuke awaited
the dishonoured Chondawat. Four days after the
crime had been committed, Sangram reached the
capital — a man in every respect the reverse of Ajit.
Audaciously brave, the chief of the Suktawats feared
neither the frown of his sovereign nor the sword of
his enemy. Without introduction he made his way
into the presence. "O dastard!" he exclaimed,
"thou hast thrown dust on the Sesodia race; thou
hast defiled by thy sin the blood which has flowed
in purity for a hundred ages. Let no Sesodia ever
hold up his head again ! The line of Bappa Rawul
is at an end. Heaven has ordained this, a signal
for our destruction." Then, turning upon Ajit, who
was present, he continued: "Thou stain on the
Sesodia race, thou impure of Rajput blood, dust
be on thy head as thou hast covered us all with
shame. May you die childless, and your name
die with you."
The traitor to manhood and his sovereign dared
no reply. Sangram died not long afterwards, but
his curse was fulfilled. The Rana had ninety-five
children ; but only one of his sons grew to manhood,
and only two daughters reached the marriageable
age. The latter were united to the princes of
Jaisalmir and Bikanir, in which states the Salic
law precludes all honour through female descent.
With regard to Aji't, the curse was fully accomplished.
Scarcely a month after it was uttered, his wife and
two sons died. The traitor himself wandered from
shrine to shrine performing penance, his beads in
his hand, and Rama ! Rama ! ever on his lips. But
enough of him ! Let us dismiss him with the words
of Sangram, " dust on his head."
http://www.archive.org/stream/todsannalsofraja00todjrich/todsannalsofraja00todjrich_djvu.txt