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Please enter a valid web address * About * Blog * Projects * Help * Donate * Contact * Jobs * Volunteer * People * Sign up for free * Log in Search metadata Search text contents Search TV news captions Search radio transcripts Search archived web sites Advanced Search * About * Blog * Projects * Help * Donate Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape * Contact * Jobs * Volunteer * People Full text of "The Indian Empire " See other formats ka Se Sx “a, oa ‘ Sams “ Ss 2 oa ENEWS HG ais < t My ch Aes 4 - PY acc te Lacie eee 32 33 34 36 37 38 39 4) 43 di 46 47 48 50 51 52 53 34 53 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 66 | 70 | 74 76 80 81 82 83 Jumma Musjid, Mandoo - The Water Palace, Mandoo. The Fortress of Dowlutahad - Aurungzebe’s Tomh, Rozah - View of Sassoor, inthe Deecan - Tombs of the Kings, Goleonda_ - The British Basteleney at Ay, derabad Bejapoor - Sultan Mahomed Shah's Ton Bejapoor Seven-storied Palace, Bejapoor - Palaec of the Seven Stories, Bejapoor Mosque of Mustapha Khan, Bejapoor Tomh of Thrahim Padshah, Sys Taj Bowlee, Bejapoor - - Asser Mahal, Bejapoor - Ce Singhan Mahal, Torway, Bejapoor Hlindoo Temples and Palace, Madura Entrance to the Cave of Elephanta Triad Figure, interior of Elepbanta Cave of Kar li - - - Front View of Kylas, Caves of Ellora To face page 57 To face page 479 479 493 159 - 153 20 face page Exeavated enaale of Hes Caves of Ellora - - a Dus Outar, I tora - - - Rameswur, Caves of Ellora - - Skeleton Group in the JET, Caves of. Ellora - io Interior of Dher Warra, Ellora - Sutteeism on the banks ‘of the Ganges - View of Allahahad, showi inn the Fort View of Lueknoww - Dewan Khass, or Hall of Andyenees iPlay of Delhi - - Agra— View of the Prineipat Street Tomh of Elmad-ud-Dowlah, Agra ‘The Residency, Lucknow - - The 1lill Fortress of Gwalior - View of Delhi, from the Palace Gate NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 113 115 115 116 117 19 122 124 128 130 132 134 140 143 INTRODUCTION. Tus Anglo-Indian Empire! what do these words represent in the minds of the people of Britain ? They speak of dominion over a far-distant sunny land, rich in barbaric gold, . =] precious stones, and architectural beauty, occupying upwards of a million square miles of the most varied, fertile, and interesting portion of this globe, and inhabited by more than one hundred million of the human race. The carly history of this wonderful country lies hid in deep obscurity. Not the obscurity that naturally attends insignificance, but, far otherwise, caused by the dense veil which Time drew around Ancient India, in thickening folds, during centuries of deterioration; leaving the ruins of magnificent cities, and widely- scattered records graven in mysterious characters on almost imperishable materials, to attest the existence of civilised races—regarding whom even tradition is silent—at a date long prior to the Christian era, Whenee India was peopled, is quite unknown; but thirty different Jan- guages, and an cqual diversity of appearance and character, dress, manners, and customs, seem to indicate long-continued immigration from various quarters. The Alexandrine era (b.c. 330) throws light on little beyond the Macedonian invasion of the north-western frontier; the Arab incursions (A.p. 709) afford only a few glimpses of the borders of the Indus; and the thirteen expeditions of Mahmood the Ghuznivede (a.p. 1000 to 1025), give little beyond a vague and general idea of the wealth of the country and the dense population of the Western Coast, whose idolatry Mahmood was empowered to scourge with the strong arm of an Iconoclast; though he himself was but an instrument in the hands of Providence; and in battering down guardian fortresses and destroying temples and shrines dedicated to false gods, had evidently no higher motive than that of pillaging the dedicated treasures, and carrying away the worshippers into slavery. From this period we can faintly trace the progress of Mohammedan con- quest in India, to the establishment of the dynasty known as the Slave Kings of Dethi (A.v. 1208.) Its founder, NKootb-oo-decn, originally a ‘Turki slave, established the centre of Moslem dominion in the grand old Tindoo capital, chiefly by reason of the disunion which had arisen among the leading Rajpoot princes upon the failure of a direct heir, and the consequent jealousies and disputes regarding the suececssion. Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com | of them have left records not only of the public events in which they played a | Aurungzebe (4.D. 1658), the ablest and most powerful, but the most ambitious and formed by the Hindoo adventurer, Sevajec, into a powerful state; the hated and | = ee INTRODUCTION. Then the page of history becomes more and more legible until it records | the invasion of Timur or Tamerlane (a.p. 1398), the terrible details of the siege of Delhi, and the general massacre in which it terminated; and all the horrors enacted before “the apostle of desolation” took his departure, carrying off men and women of all ranks and ages into slavery, and leaving the devoted city withont a government, and almost without inhabitants. The succeeding Indian annals, though confused, are tolerably full to the commencement of that important epoch which comprises the reigns of the Great Moguls. This brings us within the pale of modern history: we can note the growth and decay of Mogul dominion, and trace, at least in measure, the operating causes of its extension and decline. Viewed as a mere series of biographies, the lives of the Great Moguls attract by incidents, which the pen of fiction, fettered by attention to probability, would hardly venture to trace. The members of this dynasty had a decidedly literary turn, and several leading part, but also of the domestic scenes in which they figured as sons, husbands, or fathers. The value of these memoirs in elucidating or corroborating the histories of the period, is, of conrse, very great, and their authenticity rests on solid gronnds, apart from the strong internal evidence they afford of having been actually written by the persons whose names they bear. Nothing can be more characteristic than the intense self-adulation with which Timur, or Tamerlane, narrates his perfidions and sanguinary career, except perhaps the peculiar power of observation and analysis brought to bear on new scenes which mark the autobiography of his descendant Baber, who, following in his footsteps, invaded India from Cabool, and, after a fierce struggle on the plains of Paniput (a.p. 1526), gained easy possession of Delhi and Agra, and sneceeded in laying the foundation of an extensive empire. Humayun (a.p. 1530), Akber (a.p, 1556), Jehangeer (A.D. 1605), Shah Jeban (A.D. 1628), all encountered vicissitudes of the most singular and varied character; and the Mogul history increases in interest until it culminates in the long reign of bigoted of his race. During his sway the predatory hordes of Maharashtra were despised Mahrattas grew strong upon the spoil of independent kingdoms demolished by the hanghty emperor; and finally, his troops, worn by incessant toil, became mutinous for want of pay and provisions, and suflered their aged leader to be hunted even to the death by foes he had been accustomed to treat as utterly contemptible. The decay of the empire, which commenced several years before = oe Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com rebelling against their govermucnt and warring with the rulers of neighbouring ‘states or provinces, aggravated the internal disorganisation. Nor were external | foes wanting to complete the work of destruction: adventurers of all creeds and complexions fought ficreely over the ruins; while, distancing meancr com- petitors, Nadir Shah (a.v. 1739) and Ahmed Shah (a.p. 1759), the robber Kings of Persia and Affghanistan, swooped down like vultures to seeure their share of the carcass; and the chicf cities of India, especially Delhi, | repeatedly witnessed the niost sanguinary enomnitics, and continued to do so until, one by one, they became gradually included in the widening cirele of British supremacy. And why dwell thus on the past at such a crisis as this, when the magic | circle of our power has been rudely broken—when Delhi, filled to overflowing with all the munitions of war, has been treacherously snatched from our unsuspectine hands—and when the Crescent, raised again in deadly strife against the Cross, has been reared aloft as if in testimony that the Moslems who came into India proclaiming war to the death against idolatry, have quite abandoned their claim to a Divine mission, and are affecting to make common cause with the Hindoos, whose creed and practice they formerly | declaimed against with so much horror and disgust?) Now Mohammedans and Hindoos unite in committing crimes of a character so deep and deadly, so foul and loathsome, that we find no parallel for them; not in the relentless, | inventive vengeance of the Red Indians; not even in that crisis of civilised | infidelity, that fierce paroxysm of the Freneli Revolution, still shudderingly ealled the “ Reign of Terror.” ‘The Red Republicans made publie avowal of atheism; and awful was the depravity into which they sank, world-wide the | shame they incurred: but recantation soon followed. ‘hese treacherous | Sepoys, who have so suddenly risen in a body, violating every oath of fidelity, | INTRODUCTION, 3 the death of Aurmigzebe (1.p. 1707), then beeame rapid; usurping viceroys, every tie of feeling and association—they, too, have their watchword: it is not “There is no God;” it is “ Death to the Christians 1” As in France, uo religious persecution, but rather a state of conventional | _apathy, leavened by the poison of Voltaire, Diderot, Condorcet, and their | clique, preceded the atheistical and sanguinary outburst; even so has it | | been with India, Efforts for the extension of Christianity have been wholly | | exceptional; the rule has been tolerance, amounting to indifference, in all religious matters. Jew who have been in the habit of reading Indian periodicals, much less of mixing in Indian society, will deny that, however manifest the desire for the diffusion of the Gospel might be in individuals, the government had remained markedly neutral. | t Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary | ‘NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 4 INTRODUCTION. The Mussulmans, let it be repeated, subjugated and governed India in the character of anti-idolaters. They tolerated—and barely tolerated—the heathenism around them, to which their aversion was, for the most part, quite undisguised; and they were always eager for individual conversions. Their open assertion of the superiority of their faith was viewed as natural by the Hindoos; nor does any angry feeling appear to have been excited, save ‘in exceptional cases of actual persecution. Aurungzebe certainly alienated a large portion of his subjects by reviving a long-abandoned capitation-tax on infidels; and whether he did this from a desire to refill the treasury emptied _ by incessant warfare, or from sheer bigotry, the result was the same. Many causes (among which may be named, not as the avowed ones, but certainly not as the least powerful—sloth and sensuality, fostered by an enervatine elnnate) have concurred in rendering the Indian followers of Mohammed comparatively regardless of that integral portion of their creed which enjoins its extension by all and every means. But no earnest believer in ‘the Koran can be tolerant of idolatry; and therefore, when we hear of | Moslem and Hindoo linked together in a most unprovoked erusade against Christians, it is manifest that the pretext is altogether false, and that the Mussulman, who is taught by the book he deems inspired never to name our Blessed Lord without reverence, or idols without abhorrence, cannot now be actuated by any religious motive, however perverted or fanatical, in violating the first principles of his faith and by affected sympathy with the professors of a creed heretofore declared utterly polluted and debasing, using them as dupes and tools in carrying out an incendiary plot, the planned details of which only Devil-worshippers, possessed by unclean spirits, could have been supposed capable of conceiving and executing. The conspiracy, beyond a doubt, has originated in the desire of the Molammedans to recover their lost supremacy in India. Its immediate and secondary causes are involved in temporary obscurity; but the primum mobile must be sought tor in the pages of history. It is true the flame has spread like wildtire: but the important question for those who are capable of grappling with the com- plicated bearings of this all-engrossing subject, is not—what hand applied the match? but how came such vast masses of combustibles to be so widely spread, so ready for ignition? To understand this in any satisfactory degree, the inquirer must be content to begin at the beginning, by carefully weighing the fragmentary records we possess of the history and character of the Hindoos as a distinct people, noting the causes which led to their gradual subjugation by the Moslems; next, those which paved the way for the introduction of Muropean Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com — INTRODUCTION. 5 Powers; and, lastly, the establishment and operation of British supremacy throughout India. The imdifference which the British nation and its rulers have so long evinced to the study of Asiatic history, has been most unfortunate. Wrapped in fancied seeurity, we have been too ignorant to be anxious, too indolent to be watchful; and the few who have felt it an tnperative duty to speak words of warning by bringing the experience of the past to bear upon | the signs of the present, have found themselves set down as alarmists on this point at lest, whatever their general character for ability and sound judg- | ment. Yet the fact is certain, that almost every leading anthority from the | date of our earliest assumption of territorial power, has dwelt forcibly on the | necessity for unsleeping vigilance im the administration of Indian allairs. | This conviction has been the invariable result of extensive acquaintanee with | the natives, and it is abundantly corroborated by the recorded antecedents of both Hindoos and Mohammedans. The history of India, whether in early times or during the Mohammedan epoch, is—as the brief onthne sketched in preeeding pages was designed to indicate—-no less interesting as a narrative than important in its bearing on the leading events of the present epoch, which, in fact, cannot, without it, be rendered intelligible. The struggles of Huropean Powers for Asiatic ascen- dancy, form leading features in the annals of each of these states. Portugal | was first in the field, and long and fierce was the combat she waged to maintain exelusive possession of the rich monopoly of Oriental commerce. The Dutch (then known as the Netherlanders) enjoyed a share of the profits in the capacity of carriers between the Portuguese factories and the} | northern nations of Europe; but when, in 1579, they formed themselves into a | | separate government in defiance of the power of Philip of Spain, that monarch, who then governed with an iron sceptre the united kingdoms of Spain and Portugal, forbade the employment of the Dutch as inter- mediaries—a prolibition which led to their trafficking on their own account, | | forming various trading settlements im the Mast in the commencement of the seventeenth century, aud supplanting their former employers. The first attempts of England were made, at the same period, by a company of London merehants, warmly encouraged by the Queen, who signed a charter on their behalf on the last day of the sixteenth century. During the following century the English continued to be simply traders, with no cravings for political or territorial agerandisement—absorbed in the business of buying and selling, and anxious only for the safety of their flect, which rapidly became more formidable and extensive in proportion to the rich Cc Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 6 INTRODUCTION, freight it was destined to bear through seas infested with pirates, and fre- quently preoccupied by hostile Huropean squadrons. The eighteenth century opened upon an entirely new phase of Indian annals, The decay of Mogul power, which had, as has been stated, com- meneced before the death of Aurnngzebe in 1707, was greatly accelerated by that event, and by the war of suecession which followed, as a natural con- sequence, the death of a Mogul emperor. The will of the deceased ruler decreed the division of his douinions amoug his sons; and had they consented to this arrangement, and cordially united in carrying it out, their allotted portions might possibly have been consolidated into distinct kingdoms. But brotherly love rarely flourishes under the shadow of a despotie throne; and the House of Timur formed no exception to this rule, having evinced a remarkable tendency to fratrieide throughout the entire period of its Indian career. The younger sons of Aurungzebe went to war with their elder brother, each on his own account, and died the death they had provoked, leaving the survivor, Bahadur Shah, to rule as best he might the scattered territories styled the Empire. Anything more devoid of organisation—of any approach to unity—than the so-called Empire, cannot well be conceived. When Aurungzebe snatched the sceptre from the hands of his father, Shah Jehan, and condemned him to lite-long captivity, the dominions he usurped were comparatively well governed, aud might, under the sway of a ruler of sueh unquestionable ability, such indomitable perseverance, have been consolidated into a comparatively homogeneous mass But the unhallowed ambition at whose shrine he had sacrificed the liberty of his father and the lives of his brothers, still hurried him on, rendering him reekless of the internal decay which was manifestly at work in the very heart of his kingdom, while he was lavishing his resources in spreading desolation and ruin, famine and the sword, through every independent kingdom within his reach—extending his own only in name, throwing down governments and ancient land-marks, | yet erecting none in their stead; becoming terrible as a destroyer, when he might have been great as a statesman and a consolidator. A right view of the character of Aurungzebe, and a patient investigation of his career, is absolutely necessary to the obtainment of a clear insight into the state of India at the period when the Mnelish Bast India Company began to exchange their position of traders on sufferance for that of territorial lords. | The first steps of this strange transformation can hardly be said to have been voluntary. The Wuglish merchants were still essentially traders.. An exami- nation of the Hast India House records (and no attempt has ever been made to garble or lide them away from friend or foe), will prove to the most pre- Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com INTRODUCTION. 7 judiced observer, that, us a body, they persistently opposed the acquisition of dominion. Nothing short of complete indifference can necount for the exces- sive ignorance of Indian politics manifested in their oflicial correspondence. Tt may, indeed, be urged that English factors in a foreign land, in addition to their characteristic reserve, are naturally much engrossed by the duties and eares of their calling, and, apart from prejudice, may well be excused for a degree of preoccupation which prevents them trom making any very vigorous | effort to penetrate the barriers of language and creed, manners and customs, which separate them from the people with whom they come to traffic. A time arrived, however, when the English could no longer be blind to the alarming political and social state of India. Every year, much more every decade, the disorganisation increased. Certain native Hindoo states, such as Mysoor, Travancore, the little mountainous principality of Coorg, and a few others, had been exempted, by their position or their instenificance, froin Moslem usurpation. With these exceptions, strife and anarchy spread over the length and breadth of India. It was no organised struggle of race or ereed; for Mussnlman fought against Mussnlman, Hindoo against Hindoo, and each against the other; Affghan warred with Mogul, Mogul with Rajpoot; Mahratta with all. The hand of every man was raised against his neighbour: the peasant went armed to the plough—the shepherd stood ready to defend his flock with his life; the energy and determination of local authorities kept up some degree of order in their immediate districts; but, in general, the absence of a government strong enough to protect its innocent subjects from internal vice or external aggression, was manifested in the fearful audacity with which the Pindarry, Dacoity, and Thue, the trained marander, thief, and assassin, pursued their murderous avocations, | in the blaze of noon as in the darkness of midnight. The Hindoos fell back upon the ancient village system, which the usurping Mohammedans had vainly striven to destroy; and the imternal organisation of the > little municipalities, each possessing its own Potail | or Mayor, enabled them to parry, or at least rally from, attacks from — without. : . The English laboured for the effectual fortification of the various factories gradually established in different parts of India, and included, according to their situation, m the three presidencies of Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay. Armed neutrality, however, would have been barely practicable, even so far as the numerous warring native powers were concerned. The conduct of | their European rivals rendered such a position quite untenable. The French Mast India Company had, so far as trade was concerned, proved a decided , Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 8 INTRODUCTION, failure: its employés were very interior to the English as factors; but as politieal agents, they possessed diplomatic instincts peculiar to themselves. Dumas, Dupleix, and the gifted La Bourdonnais, saw clearly the oppor- tunity afforded for the territorial establishment of their nation, and they eagerly took part in the quarrels around them, making offensive and defensive alliances with the neighbouring states, interfering in cases of disputed succession, and taking, with bold and unfaltering steps, the apparent road to political power. None of the English functionaries approached their rivals in ability; but they could not be blind to the increasing danger of their situation; and the example set by the Irench, of drilling native troops and organising them as far as possible in accordance with European notions, was followed throughout the British settlements. Then came the inevitable struggle between the two powers whose unsleeping rivalry had so often evidenced itself in strife and bloodshed at the very ends of the earth. At first they met in indirect hostility as the auxiliaries of uative princes; but the first indications of European war were eagerly seized on as a cause for direct opposinon, aud a fierce strugele ensued, which eventually left the Enelish complete masters of the field. While the Carnatic, in which Madras is situated, was the scene of this contest, the English in Bengal were sub- jected to the most oppressive exactions by the usurping Mohammedan | governor, Surajah Dowlah, whose seizure and pillage of Calcutta in June, 1756, was marked by the horrible massacre of the “ Black Hole”’—a deed which, up to that period, even Mohammedan annals can hardly equal in atrocity; but to which, after the lapse of a hundred years, many terrible parallels have been furnished, The tidings spread hke wildfire through the British settlements, and the conviction became deep and general, that it would be madness to trust to the fuith or humanity of such men as the depraved Surajah Dowlah and his Moslem compeers. The Mogul Empire had become an empty uame so far as the distant provinces were concerned, and there was absolutely no uative | state either strone enough to protect the [nglish settlements, or just enough to be trusted. Never was the indomitable resolve of Britons in a foreign \land more steruly tested, or more triumphantly evinced, than when their | fortunes seemed at the lowest ebb—when the French and the Mohammedans, in different quarters, menaced thetr overthrow aud extinction. “'To drive these dogs into the sea!” was then, as now, the fervent aspiration of every Moslem regarding every European. But they wished to squeeze the orange before they threw away the rind. They were themselves divided, and had plans of individual ageraudizement to carry out against each other, and Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com INTRODUCTION. 9 | generally over the Hindoos; and they well knew the value of Jeuropean co-operation and instrnetion in the art of war. The recapture of Calcutta was speedily effected hy a force of 900 Juropean troops and 1,500 Sepoys, commanded by a eci-devant writer, who had turned soldier, and risen to distinction in the Carnatie war. Robert Clive—for it was he—looked round and saw the opportunity offered for exchanging the precarious footing then oceupied by his countrymen for one of far greater Importance and security. The Iindoos were daily becoming more impatient of the Mohammedan yoke, and the haughty Mussnimans | were themselves divided regarding their ruler, whose reckless profligacy and violent temper had given many of them provocation of a description which | | excites, in an Oriental, feelings of the fiercest and most enduring revenee. | The Kuglish watched the course of affairs with deep anxiety, aud soon ascertained that, in violution of a treaty entered into after the reconquest of Caleutta, Surajah Dowlah was plotting with the French for their destruction. | | Unquestionably, this procedure justified them in adopting hostile measures | | woainst their treacherous foe; though it does not even palliate some of the minor details, in which the crooked policy of Clive appears in painfnl contrast to his bravery as a soldier and his skill as a general. The result was the battle of Plassy (A.D. 1757), rapidly followed by the permanent establishment of British dominion in Bengal. After this, the tide of success flowed on fast and full. If the reader will | patiently peruse the pages of this history, he will see that our power has inereased with marvellously little effort on our own part. As, when a stone is flung into a river, the first small circle expands and multiplies beyond | ealeulation—so, in India, have we gone on extending our mits, as from the | action of some inevitable necessity ; less from our own will, than because we could not stand still without hazarding the position already gained. True, | there have been most distressing instances of injustice and aggression; but these are the few and comparatively unimportant exceptions. So far as the | general obtaimment of political ascendancy in India is concerned, we may | quote the apt comparison used by an old Rajpoot prince to Colonel Tod, in 1804, as conveying a perfectly correct idea of our process of appropriation. Alluding to a sort of melon which bursts asunder when fully matured, Zalim Sing said, “ You stepped in at a lucky time; the p’foot was ripe, and you had | only to take it bit by bit.”* | | The manner in which we have acquired power in India, is one thing; the | ist 2 use we have made of it, is another and more complicated question. I*or my * tunals of Rajast’han, Vol. I, p. 766. Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 10 INTRODUCTION. / own part, I have long watched the Anglo-Indian government with feelings | been led to occupy. It is now close upon twenty years since I was permitted, by the East India Company, to edit the official records of a survey made by : : : : : || Dr. Buchanan in Hastern India; and the impression on my mind was so forcible, that I could not refrain from prefacing the selections with a declara- | tion that the handwriting was on the wall, and nothing but a complete and ‘adical alteration of our system of government, could avert the punishment | justly merited by onr misuse of the great charge committed to us. The primary reason of this misuse I believe to be the false and wicked assertion, that “we won India by the sword, and must keep it by the sword.” There is another aphorism, much older and of much higher authority, which we should do well to think on—“ They that take the sword shall perish by the sword.” We did not conquer India by violence: we came as peaceful traders, and spent long years in that capacity; and during that time we sueceeded in impressing on the minds of the natives a lively conviction of our energy, ability, and integrity. When the crisis came—as come it did, without our knowledge and greatly to our discomfiture—counting-houses were turned into barracks, bales of piece-goods helped to make barricades, clerks and writers were metamorphosed into military leaders, and, while themselves but learners, drilled the natives round them into a state of discipline before unknown. Thus was formed the nucleus of that army on which we have leaned as if that, and that alone, had been the means of our obtaining dominion in India. For the perfect organisation of that mighty force, which lately numbered 800,000 men, we laboured with unwearied patience; and to this grand object we sacrificed every other. So long as the Sepoys were duly eared for, the condition of the mass of the people was a matter of coim- parative indifference. It was not the Great Ruler of the Universe, whose inscrutable deerees had placed this vast tract of heathendom in the hands of a people who professed to serve Him and Him only; rejecting every tradition of men; relying only on the mediation of His Son; resting for guidance only on His written word; asking only the interpretation of ILis _, Holy Spirit;—not so! The Anglo-Indian dominion had nothing whatever to do with any such religious speculations. We were not bound to set before the | people the example of the faith which we affect to believe the very leaven of the earth. Until the last few years we did not view it even us a case of stewardship. We were not even called upon to exert our energy for developing Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com of deep anxiety, and have labonred to the utmost of my ability to awaken the | British nation to a sense of the responsible and critical situation they had — INTRODUCTION. VW muss of the people. And why? Beeause free Britons, in the middle of the peo] 5 B the physical resources of the country, and amehorating the condition of the | y r oe . eye | | nineteenth eentury, have scen fit to assume the position of military despots, drowning the convietion that India was a God-given trust, in the vague notion of its being “an empire of opinion ;”’ and then sinking, by an easy transition, from rationulism into the more popular notion of sheer foree—* an empire of the sword,” held by the might of our own strong arm, Seepticism and cowardice lie at the reot of our present disasters: delibe- rately have we chosen the fear of man, which blinds and enervates, rather than the fear of God, which enlightens and strengthens. With infatuated credulity we have uursed in our bosom the serpent that has stung us to the quick. Tolerance is, indeed, an essentially Christian quality; but who shall dare assume that praise for the Christianity which was made in the persons of high Protestant (?) ollicials, to bow its head before the licentious proflizacy of the Mussuhnans, and the heathen abominations and disgusting impurities of the modern Brahininical priesthood, and to witness, in silence, the spiritual enslavement and physical degradation of the mass ? We thonelt, perhans, both Mussulmans and Brahmins too enervated by | git, | Ps; y their respective orgics to be dangerous as enemies. This but proves our utter ignorance of the Oriental character, especially as developed in the Mohammedans. Let the reader e@lance over the history of their founder (and I have striven to sketch it in a subsequent page, in faithfulness, and not with the pen of a caricaturist), he will see in the False Prophet the type of sensuality, bigotry, ambition, erounded and rooted in the fiercest fanaticisin ; and that type has been perpetually reproduced, and will coutinue to be so until Mobammedanism shall be swept from the face of the earth. How soon that may be, none ean prophesy; but the general rising now | taking place among the Mussulmans in Africa and Syria, as well as in India, ure pointed at by many observers as preceding and indicating the death-throes of this once powerful, but already deeply sunken race. For us, if we would hope to conquer, it must be by turning to the Lord of Ilosts, as a nation, in deep repentance and humility: then only may we justly look for present help, and anticipate for the future that gift in which | we have been so ’amentably deficient—*a right judgment in all things.” Thus favoured, we shall not shrink from the responsibilities of au evangelized nation; but shall understand, that there is no surer way of obtaining respect in the eyes of the quick-witted Hindoos, than by a consistent adherence to our religions professions. The means commend themselves to | every unprejudiced person really versed in Indian affairs; and, assuredly, none | | | | Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com other will be blessed of God. We cannot hope to pass off indifference for tolerance: the Mohammedans see through the flimsy diseuise, and bil the and vexatious land-tenure, the defective monetary circulation of India, have come under discussion; and if, as God in merey grant, Britain is permitted | educated in India. A noble field has been annually opened fur the youth of Britain, and an expansive tone given to 12 INTRODUCTION. | heathen throw off the ignominious yoke of Kafirs (infidels.) Christianity they reverence, and dread to see us manifest any tokens of it. Well they may; for nothing else will cover our lead in the day of battle. That day has come. May we now have grace to control the fearful passions provoked by the most | horrible outrages; and may the memory of our own shortcomings towards - God, enable us, if He gives the victory, to use it mercifully. Let us not forget, that the innocent blood spilt in the last few weeks, cannot blot out the memory of the debt which Jneland owes to India.* The Parliament of Britain now must dictate the course to be followed in a matter of vital importance to the nation whose opinions it represents. The portion of the British public impressed with sound and practical religious views, is, happily, larger and more influential than would appear to superficial observers. The fact is indicated in the increase of missionary enterprise, the extension of education, and, indirectly,,im the progress of public improvements, and thie initiation of reformatory measures. The faulty judicial system, the partial to retain the brightest jewel in her crown—the most valuable of her transmarine possessions—it is fervently to be desired that we may apply ourselves diligently to remedy all deficiencies, to repair, as far as possible, past neglects, and provide against future emergencies, The details of the present terrible episode will be given fully in subsequent pages; day by day that close seems approaching, with the record of which the Author hopes to be enabled to terminate this Work. : * The pecuniary debt is wholly on the side of England. The cost, alike of civil and military government, including the payment of the royal troops, has been entirely defrayed from the Indian revennes: so, if we sueceed, must be the expenses of the present insurrection, The money remittances to England from the three Presidencics average five million sterling for the last sixty years. There is scarcely a country in the United Kingdom but has had the value of its landed property enhanced by the investments of fortunes, the fruit of civil or military services or of commercial success in Hindoostan. Again, how many British statesmen and commanders have had their genius clicited and society by the constant discussion of great subjects. The merchant and the mannfactnrer can hest estimate the impartance of a large, increasing, and Incrative market, free from high or hostile tariffs ; and the advantage of an almost unlimited command of commodities, the regular obtain- ment of which is essential to the steady employment of their operations. Nor must it be forgatten, that Indian Imports and Exports, to the amount of thirty million sterling, now furnish profitable employment to the best class of mercantile shipping. 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CHAPTER I: EARLY HISTORY, MYTITOLOGICAL AND TRADITIONAL—PERSIAN AND OTHER INVA- SIONS—GREKEK EXPEDITION AND CONQUESTS OF ALEXANDER—PLUNDERING | INCURSIONS OF MAHMOOD THM GITUZNIVEDE—MOHAMMEDAN CONQUESTS, | DOMINION, AND DOWNFALL—RISE AND PROGRESS OF BRITISH POWER ANID | SUPREMACY. | Ancient [listory, ro rie time or ALEX-|cxactions of native or foreign rulers, has AnpEn.—India or Hindoostan, with its noble | ever been the mainstay of the people. The rivers, diversificd climate, productive soil, | invaders, if such they were, probably brought aud extensive coast-line, offered advantages | with them the elements of civilisation; and for colonization, whieli were availed of at a} the peaceful pursuits of pastoral and agri- very carly period in the Instory of the|ecnitural life would uecessitate a certain human race. Ofits first inhabitants we know | amount of concentration, as uo single man little, heyond their being, as it is generally | or family could dwell alone in a country believed, still represented by various bar-| whose dense jungle required combined la- barons tribes who yet inhalit the mountains; hour, both to clear it for use and guard it and forests, and follow rude religions prae- | from wild beasts. All this, however, relates tices that are no part of the primitive IJin-| to a period concerning which we posscss no doo system. By whom or at what time] historical record whatever—in which must these were subdued or expelled there is no! have originated what may be termed Brah- ground to rest anything more than a sur-|minical Tlindooism, whose rise and early mise; and of the many that have been, or] progress is shrouded in dense obscurity. might be, hazarded ou this diffienlt but in-} From the internal evidence afforded by tie teresting subject, perhaps not the least rea-| system itself, so far as we are acquainted sonable is the supposition based on the varied | with it during its carly purity, it would seem craniclogical development, and distinct lan-! to have been framed by a small confederacy guages of the existing Tlindoo race—that| of persons, whose knowledge, both religious they were originally composed of numerons]| and seeular, being far in advanee of their migrating hordes who, at intervals, poured | age, had enabled them to draw up rules for in from the wild Mongolian steppes and) the guidanee of their conntrymen, hoth as Turkomanian rauges, from the forests of) regarded their duty to God and their fel- | Seythia, the arid shores of the Caspian, and] lows. Fully aware, as it would appear, of the sunburnt plains of Mesopotamia; from/ the great fact, that human institutions have the plateaux of Persia, the deserts of Arabia, | strength and permanence only when based and even from the fertile valley of the Nile, | on a religious principle, they set forth their allured by the extraordinary fertility of this! own scheme as the direct ordination of the most favoured portion of the Asiatic econ- | “ Sclf-Existent One,” the “Great First tinent, or driven from their native land by | Cause,” whose attributes they described in a tyranny or want. Time and cireumstanees | tone of solemn grandcur not unbefitting their gradually fused the heterogencous mass into | high theme; and to enforce their precepts sometinng like homogeneity; the first step to | and heighten their influence, made much use which was probably made by the introduc-| of the rude lyries extant among the people, tion, in a rade form, of that village system | to which they added others. These were com- which so markedly characterises India when | piled under the name of the Vedas (a word viewed as a whole, and which, under the) derived trom a Sanserit root, signifying fo scourge of sanguiuary wars, aud the heavy | évow), by one Vyasa, who lived in the four- D Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com 14 teenth century before the Christian era. In describing the religious creed of the Hindoos, and commenting on the opinions entertained respecting the comparative an- tiquity of Brahminism and Boodhism, the most ancient sacred writings of eaeh of these great seets will be noticed; but here it is only necessary to remark, that the Vedas bear incontestable evidence of having been written at different periods, some being in very rugged Sanscrit, others, though an- tiquated, coming within the pale of that language in the polished form in whieh Sir William Jones found it, when he declared it to be “of a wonderful structure, more per- fect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than | either.”* One only of the Vedas, the Sama Veda, has yet been translated into English. The translator, Dr. Stephenson, of Bombay, Jeans to the opinion of its having been com- posed out of India, but brought there by the Brahmins from some northern country at a very remote period. Another authority, after a careful examination of the same book, has arrived at a directly opposite conclusion. Be this as it may, there are expressions in the Vedas which prove that the majority of the detached pieces of different kinds of poetie composition which they comprise, were Written in a country where maritime commerce was highly csteemed, where a sa- crificial ritual had already been fixed, and | mythological legends abounded. ‘The fre- quent reference to war and to chariots in- | dicate, moreover, the previous establishment of separate states, and the cultivation of military art. | ‘The first comprehensive view of the state of society among the Ilindoos is afforded by the code of laws which bears the name of Mcnu, and is supposed, but not on very convincing data, to have been compiled in or about the ninth century, w.c.f Whe- ther Menu himself were a real person- age or no is au open question, and one of little importance, since his appearance is merely dramatie, like that of the speakers * Asiatic Researches, vol. i., p. 422, 7 Arthur's Dhssion to the Alysore, p. 441. } Sir W. Jones supposed the Code to have been compiled about 300 years after the Vedas (4s. Iv., vol. vii., p. 283); but Elphinstone fixes the date ut some time about half-way between Alexander, in the fourth century, b.c., and the Vedas in the four- teenth. (Vol. i, p. 430.) § Cast, the common word, is not Indian, but Mng- lish ; and is given in Johnson’s Dietionary as derived | from the Spanish or Vortuguese, caste, a breed, In Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary CODE OF MENU—NINTH CENTURY, B.C. in the dialogues of Plato or of Cicero. No hint is given as to the real compiler, nor is there any clne to the ancient commentator Callnca, whose endeavours to gloss over and | explain away some doetrines of Menn, scems — to indieate that opinion had already begun to change, even in his day; while many suc- ceeding commentators, and some of very ancient date, speak of the rules of Menu as appheable to the good ages only, and not extending to their time. The chief feature in the eode is its di- vision of the people into four classes or easts;§ namely, the Brahmins or sacer- dotal; the Cshatriya or military; the Vai- syas or industrial ; and the Soodras|| or ser- vile. The three first classes were termed the “twice-born,” their youths being admitted, at certain ages, by a solemn ceremony, to participate in the religious and social privi- leges of theirelders; but the fourth and low- est cast was rigidly excluded from all these. The degradation of the Soodras has given rise to the idea of their being the people whom the superior classes had conquered ; and similar inferenees may be drawn from the fact that, while the “ twice-born” were all strictly forbidden, under any circumstances, to leave, what, for want of a better term, may be styled Hindoostan Proper; the Soodra, distressed for the means of sub- sistence, might go where he would. It ap- pears, however, from the eode, that there were still cities governed by Soodra kings, in which Brahmins were advised not to re- side. From this it seems probable that the independent Soodra towns were situated in such of the small territories into which Ilindoostan was divided as yet retained their freedom, while the whole of the tracts south of the Vindya mountains remained un- touched by the invaders, and unpenctrated by their religion, On the other hand, it is remarkable that neither the code of Menu, nor the more ancient Vedas, so far as we are at present acquainted with their con- teuts, cver allude to any prior residence, or to a knowledge of more than the name of | Sir W. Jones’ Translation of Menu, the word em- ployed is ‘elass :” the Brahmins constantly use the Sanserit term as signifying a species. |i There ave few things more perplexing in the study of Indian history than the various modes of spelling proper names und other words, which have resulted from the ditheulty of representing them in the characters of our alphabet. in the present work, the author has deemed it advisable to adopt that best known and most easily read, in preference to what might have been more critically correct, NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com HWINDOO CIIRONOLOGY. SOLAR AND LUNAR DYNASTIES. 15 any country ont of India. [yen mytho- logy gocs no farther than the Himalaya mountains for tle loeation of the gods. With regard to the condition of the Soodras, it appears to have been in many points similar, but in some deeidedly preferable, to that of the helot, the slave, or the serf of the Greek, the Roman, and the feudal sys- tems, excepting only its stern prohibition of any share in the ordinances of religion. But this might have originated in the probable cireumstance of the conquered people having a distinet erccd of their own, to prevent the spreading of which among their disciples, the Brahmins* (in whom, Elphinstone has well said, the common interests of their class, mingled, probably, with much pure zeal for their monotheistic faith, was deeply rooted) united religion and rank so elosely in their able scheme, that to break through, or even in minor observances to deviate from the strict rules of duty laid down for the guidance of the several regencrate classes, was to forfeit position, and literally to incur the penalty of a civil death, far passing excommunication in severity, and to place themselves undcr a ban which wearisome penance could alone remoye. One passion—and it would scem only one—was strong cnough to break down the barriers of cast. A mixed race sprang up, who were gradually formed into classes, and divided and subdivided, until the result is now scen in an almost countless number of small! communities. In subsequent sections, in describing manners, customs, laws, and government, it will be necessary to show what these were in the days of Menu, and the changes which gradually took place up to the period of Enghsh dominion; but at present we are more immediately concerned with that difficult subject, the chronological succession of events in ilindoo history. Oriental research has, as yet, revealed to us but one Hindoo work that can be strictly considered historical, the Annals of Cash- mere, ably translated by Professor Wilson, which refers chiefly to a hmited territory on the extreme northern frontier of India, and contains little more than incidental men- tion of Hindoostan and the Deeean. There is, besides, an evident and not unnatural desire on the part of the native writer to aggrandize the rulers of Cashmere at the * Elphinstone suggests a doubt “whether the ecnquerors were a foreign peopie or a local tribe, like the Dorians in Greece ; or whether, indeed, they were not mercly a portion of one of the native states (a religious sect, for instance,) which had outstripped Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary expense of the neighbouring princes, which gives an impression of one-sidedness to a production possessed, notwithstanding, of mueh value and interest. The student is, therefore, compelled to fall back upon the wide field, as yet but very partially explored, presented in the sacred books, the legislative records, and the two great epie poems. The knowledge obtainable from these sources is, in too many eases, rendered comparatively useless, by the misleading chronology taught by the Brahmins, apparently as a means of sustaining the claim of their nation to a fa- bulous antiquity. The periods employed in the computation of time are equally strange and unsatisfactory, and are rendered pe- enliarly puzzling by the astronomical data on which they are partially founded. A complete revolution of the nodes and ap- sides, which they suppose to be performed in 4,320,000,000 years, forms a ealpa, or day of Brahma. Jn this are ineluded four- teen manwantaras, or periods, each contain- ing seventy-one maha yugas, or great ages, which again comprise, respeetively, four yugas, or ages, of unequal length. These last bear some resemblance to the golden, silver, brazen, and iron ages of the Grenee and are alone considered by the Brahmins as marking the periods of human history since the ercation of the existing world, which they believe to have oceurred about four million years ago. The first, or satya yuga, lasted 1,728, 000 years, through the whole of which a king named Satyavrata, otherwise called Vaivaswata, lived and reigned. This monarch is described as having eseaped with his family from an mni- versal deluge, which destroyed the rest of the world. From him descended two royal lines, one of which, under the designation of Soorya, the children of the sun, reigned at Ayodhya or Onde; the other, Chandra, or the children of the moon, at Pratisht’?hana or Vitora, in the tract between the Jumna and Ganges, through the 1,296,000 years of the second, or treta yuga; the 864, 000 years of the third, or diwapat yuga; and the first 1,000 years of the present, or cali ynga, at which time both the solar and Iunar races became extinet; as also a distinct cotempo- rary race, the descendants of Jarasandha,who began to reign in Magadha or Behar, at the their fellow eitizens in knowledge, and appropr iated all the advantages of the socicty to themselves.”— FIistory of iinet. vol.i., p. 96. + It is evident that in the time of Menu there were no slaves attached to the soil. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com | saered writings ealled the Puranas.t 16 commencement of the eali yuga. ‘The last reigning prince of the Jarasandha family was slain by his prime minister, who plaeed his own son, Pradyota, on the throne. Fifteen of the usurping raee enjoyed the sovercignty to the time of Nanda, who, in extreme old age (after a reign, it is said, of 100 years), was murdered by a Brahman, by whom a man of the Maurya race, named Chanara- Gupta, was placed on the vaeant throne.* The genealogies of the two parallel lines of the sun and moon are derived from the Sir Wiliam Jones framed his list from the Bha- gavat Purana; Captain Wilford subsequently collated his genealogieal table of the great llindoo dynasties from the Vishnu and other Puranas;{ and, if critieal researeh should eventuatly sueeeed in enabling us to eorrect the errors of Indian ehronology, mueh information may be obtained by means of those lists respeeting the early rulers. Wanting this elne, the student will find abundant material for theory, but the historian little that he dares make his own; for the narratives given in the Pnranas abound in diserepancics regarding time and plaee, and are so blended with myths and allegories, that it is next to impossible, at present, to separate truth from fiction, until the period of the Maha Bharat or Great War.§ The scene of the adventures of the first prinees, and the residence of the most fa- mous sages, appears to be uniformly placed, both in the Puranas, and the far older in- * According to Mill (vol. i, p. 160); but Elphin- stone states Chandra Gupta to have been ninth in succession from Nanda.—Vol. i., p. 261. + There are eighteen Puranas, which are considered to-have been composed between the eighth and six- teenth centuries, A.D.; but several of the authors appear to have made use of much more ancient MS. histories to interweave among their own. { The lines of the Sun and Moon, and the Magadha dynasty, are given at length by Colonel ‘Tod, in the first volume of his valuable and voluminous work the Annals of Rajasthan. They were extracted from the Puranas by a body of pundits, and differ more or less in various parts from those published by Sir W. Jones, Mr. Bentley, and Colonel Wilford. Yod's view of the vexed question of early Hindoo records may be understood from his careful enume- ration of various traditions which all “appear to point to one spol, and to one individual, in the carly history of mankind, when the Mindoo and Greek ap- proach a common focus, for there is litde doubt that Adnath, Adiswara, Osiris, Baghes, Bacchus, Menu, Mencs, designate the patriarch of mankind, Noah” (vol. i, p. 22). The solar and lunar lines he con- siders to have been established 2,256 years, 1.C., about a century and a half after she flood, the former hy Ichswaca the son of Vaivaswatoo Menu, the latter Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary RESIDENCE OF EARLY TINDOO PRINCES AND BRATIMINS. stitutes of Menu, in a tract ealled Bramha- verta, beeause of its sanctity, situated be- tween the rivers Seraswati (Sersooty) and Drishadwati (Caggar), 100 miles to the north- west of Delbi; and about 65 miles long by 20 to 40 broad.|| Probably the next territory ae- quired lay between that above-mentioned and the Jumna, and ineluded North Behar, this country being mentioned in the second plaee under the honoured name of Brahmar- shi, while Brahmins born within its boun- daries were pronounced suitable teachers of the several usages of men.*{ At Oude, in the centre of Brahmarshi, the Puranas, (in whieh the preceding early stages are not noticed,) fix the origin of the solar and lunar raees, from one or other of whieh all the royal families of aneient India were de- seended. Some fifty to seventy generations of the solar race, who, in the absence of re- liable information, appear little better than myths, bring down the Purana narrative to Rama, the ruler of a powerful kingdom in Hindoostan, and the hero of the oldest Hindu epie—the Ramayana, ‘The chief ineident is the earrying off of Sita, the queen of Rama, by Ravana, the king of the island of Lanka, or Ceylon. Rama leads an army into the Deecan, penetrates to Ceylon, and, with the assistanee of a strange people allegorized as an army of monkeys, led by Hooniman, their king, gains a complete vietory over the ra- visher, and reeovers his wife, who vindiecates her fidelity by successfully passing the or- deal of fire. Aceording to the system of by DBoodha, who married Ichswatoo’s sister Ella, asserted to be the earth personified—Boodha him- self being “the parent and first emigrant of the Indu [Sanserit for the moon] race, from Saca Dwipa or Scythia to Hindust’han” (p. 45). In another place Tod describes Boodha as the great progenitor of the ‘Tartars, Chinese, and Hindus, “ Boodha (Mercury), the son of Indu (the moon), [a male deity] became the patriarchal and spiritual leader, as Fo in China; Woden and Teutates of the tribes migrating to Europe. Hence it follows that the religion of Boodha must be cceval with the existence of these nations; that it was brought into India Proper by them, and guided them until the schism of Crishna and the Sooryas, worshippers of Bal, in time depressed them, when the Boodha religion was modified into the present mild form, the Jain” (p. 58). § See Vrinsep’s Useful Tables, Professor Wilson’s edition of the TMishnu Purana, Sir W. Jones and Colonel Wilford’s articles in Asiatic esearches, vols. ii. and y., and Dr. WY. Buchanan's J7tndvo Genealogies. | Menu, book il, v. 17, 18: Wilson, preface to Vishaw Purana, p.lxvii. {J Menu, book ii., vy. 19, 20; Elphinstone, vol. 1,, p. 388. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com NATIVE PRINCES MENTIONED IN THI RAMAYANA. dcifying great men after thir decease, which gradually erept into Brahiminism, Rama, upon his death, was honoured as a god, and jus image worshipped, his natural form being declared to have been an inearnation (thee seventh) of Vishnn, one of the three persons, or principles, of the Mindoo Trinity. A remarkable passage occurs in the Raima- yana, in whieh mention is made of certain forcign princes, who were invited by Dasaratha (the futher of Rama) to be present at the As- waniedha* or solemn sacrifice of a horse about to he offered up hy the aged monarch, to proenre from the gods the blessing of male posterity. The names mentioned are the “sovereign of Kasi or Benares, the rajalis of Magadha or Behar, of Sindu and Su- rashta (Sinde and Surat), of Unga and Savira (of which onc is conjectured to mean Aya, the other some district situated on the Persian frontier), aud, in fine, the princes of the south or the Decean. Ileeren, who cites the above passage from the Ramayana, adds—‘ they are represcntcd as the fricnds, aut some of them also as the rclations of Dasaratha, by no means however as_ his aassals. It is therefore evident that the author of the most ancicut Tlindoo epic poem eonsidered India to be divided into a nnmber of separate and independent princi- palitics.’+ This opinion, however, is not founded cn indisputable grounds, for many of his auxiliarics appear to have stood to Dasaratha in the relation of viceroys, or at least inferior chicftains. The antiquity of tlhe pecm is unqnestioned ; the anthor, Val- miki, is said to have been cotemporary with the event he has so ably commemo- rated,{ but we have no means of fixing the date of either poem or poct execpt as some- where between that of the Vedas and the Maha Bharat, since king Dasaratha is de- seribed as deeply versed in the preecpts of * Aswa is thought to be the etymon of Asia, medha signifies “to kill.” + Heeren’s Ilisforical Researches, Oxford Transla- tion; 1533; vol. iii, p. 291. } “ Rama preceded Crishna: but as their histo- vians, Valmika and Vyasa, who wrote the events they witnessed [this point is, however, questioned], were catemporaries, it conld not have been by many years.”—-(Tod’s lnnals af Rajasthan, vol.i., p. 437. § The origin of the Pandoa family is involved in fable, invented, evidently, 10 cover some great dis- grace. According to tradition, Pandoo, whose eapi- tal was at Hastinapoora, being childless, his queen, by a charm, enticed the deities from their spheres, and became the inother af Yoodishtra, Bhima, Ar- joona (the famous archer), Nycula, and Sideva. On the death of Pandoo, Yoodishtra, with the aid of the priesthood, was declared king, although the ille- Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary We the Vedas and Vedangas, while on the other hand an epitoine of the Ramayana is given in the Maha Bharat. After Rama, sixty prinees of his race ruled in succession over his dominions, but as no more mention is made of Ayodha (Oude) it is possible that the kingdom (which was at one time called Coshala) may have merged in another; and that the capital was transferred from Oude to Canouj. The heroic pocm, entitled the Maha Bharat” or Great War, affords an account of many historical cvyents, in the details of a contest between the lines of ’andoo§ and of Curoo, two branches of the reigning lunar race for the territory of Hlastinapoora, supposed to be a place on the Ganges, north-cast of Delhi, which still bears the ancient name.{j ‘The rivals are supported by numerous allics, and some from very remote parts. ‘She cnumeration of them appears to afford evidence similar to that dedueible from the above cited pas- sage of the Ramayana, that there were many distinct states in India among which a con- siderable degree of intercourse and connec: tion was maintained. Not only are princes from the Decean and the Judus mentioned, as taking part in the struggle, but auxilia- rics are likewisc included belonging to na- tions beyond the Indus, especially the Yavans, a name which most oricntalists consider to apply exclusively to the Grecks.4] The Pandoos are eventually conquerors, but are represented as having paid so dearly for their victory, in the loss of their friends and the destruction of their armics, that the chief survivors quitted their country, and are supposed to have perished among the snows of the Himalaya.** The hero of the poem is Crishna, the great ally of the Pan- doos, who was decificd after his dcath as having been an inearnation of Vishnu, or even Vishnu himself. Ile was born of the gitimacy of himself and his brothers was asserted by Duryodhanu, the nephew of the deceased sovereign, who, as the representative of the elder branch, re- tained his title as head of the Curoos. For the whole story of the Maha Bharat, and it is a very interesting one, see the Alsiatie Researches, and the comments of Tod in the early part of his cfnnals of Rajasthan. || Elphinstone, vol. i., p. 290. € The Greeks, or lonians, are descended from Javan, or Yavan, the seventh from Japhet.—(Ted’s Rajasthan, vol.i., p. 51. ** ‘Tod surmises that they did not perish thus, but migrated into the Peloponnesus, and founded the colony of the Heraclide, stated by Volney to have been formed there 1078 years, B.c. See the reason for this conjecture, based ehicfly on the supposition of the Pandoos being the descendants of the Indian | Hercules, pp. 48, 51. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com | milkmaids, 18 royal family of Mattra on the Jumna, but. | brought up by a herdsman in the neigh- bourhood, who eoneealed him from the tyrant who sought to slay him. This phase of his life is a very favourite one with the Hindoos, and he is worshipped in an infant form by an extensive seet, as also under the figure of a beautiful youth, in eommemoration of the time he spent among the “ gopis” or dancing, spor rting, playing on the pipe, and captir ating the ‘hearts alike of rural maidens and princesses. Among the | the Jumna. mumerous exploits of his more mature age was the recovery of his usurped inheritance, whenee, being driven by foreign foes, he | removed to Divarika, m “Guzerat, where he founded a prineipality. He soon however became again involved in civil discord, and, aeeording to Tod, was slain by one of the aboriginal tribes of Bheels. The Maha Bharat deseribes the sons of Crishna as finally returning to the neighbourhood of The war is supposed to have taken place in the fonrteenth century, B.c., about 200 years before the siege of Troy, and the famous and Jengthy poem in which it is commemorated is, as before stated, attri- buted to Vyasa, the colleetor of the Vedas. The princes who suceceded the Pandoos, "are variously stated at from twenty-nine to sixty-four in number; they appear to have transferred the seat of their government to Delhi; but little beyond a name is reeorded of any of them. ‘The kings of Magadha or Behar (the line mentioned as cotem- porary with the latter portion of the dy- nasties of the sun and moon), play a more eonspicuous part in the Purana records; they afford a connceted chain from the war of the Maha Bharat to the fifth eentury after Christ, and present an appearance of proba- bility, besides reeciving striking confirma- tions from various quarters. They are fre- quently referred to in inscriptions seulptured on stone, or engraved on copper plates, conveying grants of land, or eharters of privileges and immuuitics, which are very vumerous, aud not only contain the date of the grant, and the name of the prince by whom they were conferred, but in most cases enumerate, also, certain of his pre- deeessors. The first of the Magadha kings, Jara- sandha, is mentioned in the Muha Bharat as the head of a number of petty prinecs. The rnlg monareh at the eonclusion of the war was Sahadeva; the thirty-fifth in sue- ecssion from him was Ajata Satru; and in Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary MAGADHA KINGS TO CHANDRA GUPTA, OR SANDRACOTTUS. his reign, aeeording to high anthority,* Sakya, or Gotama, the founder of the Boodha religion flourished, and died about 550, n.c. This date, if reliable, does good serviee by fixing the era of Satru; but other eminent writers consider Boodhism of much earlier origin; and some as coeval with, or even older than Brahminism.t The sixth in snecession from Satru was Nanda, who, unlike his long line of regal aneestors of the Cshatriya, or military class, was born of a Soodra mother; his ninth sue- cessor, who bore his name, was murdered by Chandra Gnpta,f a man of low birth who usurped the throne. This Chandra Gupta has been, after much rescarch, identi- fied with Sandracottus, the cotemporary of Alexander the Great, and thus a link had been obtained wherewith to conneet India with European history, and also with that of other Asiatic nations. The foregoing particulars have been given on strictly In- dian authority, for although much extrane- ous information may be obtained from early foreign writers it is difficult to ascertain how to separate truth from fietion.§ Ac- cording to Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, and Cieero, the first Indian conqueror was Baeehus or Dionysus, afterwards deified, who led an army out of Grecee, subdued India, taught the inhabitants the use of wine, and built the eity of Nysa. The Egyp- tians, who spared no pains to fortify their elaim to the highest antiquity and carliest eivilization, and never serupled to appro- priate the great deeds of the heroes of other countries, as having been performed by their own rulers, maintained that Osiris, their conqueror, having first added Ethi- opia to lis dominions, marched thenee to India through Arabia, taught the wine, and built the eity of Nysa. Both these stories evidently refer to the same person; namely, the Indian prince Vaisya- wata Mcnu; whom Tod, the pains-taking but wildly theoretical Maurice, and other writers affirm to have been no other than the patriarch Noah. Be this as it may, one of the most valnable of aneient writers, Diodorus the Sicilian, dcelares, on the authority of Indian tradition, that Bacehus (Vaisvawata Menu) belonged to their own nation, was a lawgiver, built inany stately * Ulphinstone, vol. i., pp. 209, 261. + See note to page 14. } Chandra Gupta signifies “protected by the moon.” § Justin states that. the Scylhians conquered a great part of Asia, and penetrated to Egypt 1,500 years before Ninus, first king of Assyria. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com use of | INDIAN INVASIONS.—SEMIRAMIS, SESOSTRIS, IIERCULNS, & CYRUS. 19 cities, instituted divine worship, aud erected everywhere courts of justice. The alleged invasions of Seniuramis,* Se- sostris,+ Icreules,t and Cyrus, are all denicd by Arrian, execpt that attributed to Ier- cules. Strabo disputes cven that, adding that the Persians hired mercenarics from India but never invaded it.§ The whole question respecting the nature of the alleged con- nection existing between India and Persia, is one which scarecly admits a satisfactory explanation. Before the time of Cyrus the Great (the son of King Cambyscs, the con- queror of Babylon and the Shepherd whose coming to perform the pleasure of the om- nipotent God of the Hebrews, was forctold by Isaiah)||, Persia was no more than an * The Assyrian invasion, according to the chrono- logy of Capellus, took place about 1970, a.m. It was planned by Semiramis, the widow of Ninus, who, after conseltating her hushkand's Baetrian conquests, resolved to attempt the subjugation of India, being led thereto by the reported fruitfulness of the soil and the riches of its inhabitants. She spent three years in assembling an immense army, drawn from all the provinces of her extensive empire, and caused the shipwrights of Phoenicia, Syria, and Cyprus, to send to the frontier 2,000 ships or large barks, in nieces, so that they might be carried thence to the {ndus, and there put in array against the naval force ef the Indians. All things being ready, Semiramis marched from Bactria (Balk) with an army, which it has been well said, “the Greek historians have, by their relations, rendered less wonderful than incre- dible ;” tor they describe it as having consisted of 3,000,000 foot, 500,000 horse, 100,000 war chariots, and 100,900 camels, a portion of the latter being made to resemble elephants—by means of a frame- work being covered with the skins of oxen; this device being employed to delude the Indians into the belicf of the invaders being superior to them even in this respect. Stabrobates, the king of the eountries bordering the Indus, on receiving intelli- gence of tho intended invasion, assembled his troops, augmented the number of his elephants, caused 4,000 boats to be built of cane (which is not subject to rot, or to he eaten by worms, evils known to be very prevalent at the present day), to occupy the Indus ; and headed his army on the eastern bank, in readi- ness to support them. The attacking flect heing victorious, Stabrobates abandoned his position, ]eavy- ing the enemy a free passage; and Semiramis, mak- ing a bridge of boats, crossed over with her whole foree. The counterfeit clephants, which play an important part in the narrative, were marched in front, and at first created great alarm; but the deception being revealed hy some deserters from the camp, the Indians recovered their spirits. A fierce contest ensued, in which the Assyrians had at first the advantage, but were eventually totally over- thrown, and Semiramis fled, accompanied ly a very slender retinue, and escaped with great difficulty to her own dominions. Such is the tale related by Diodorus Siculus; and, however little to be relied on in many respects, it may at least be cited in testi- mony of the reputation for wealth and civilization |- Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary inconsiderable kingdom, «fterwards compre- hended in a single province, retaining the aucient name of Fars; but the conquests of the youthful general, on behalf of his uncle and father-in-law, Cyaxares, King of Media, whom he succeeded, enabled him to unite the thrones of Persia and Media, as well as to sway neighbouring and distant states, to an extent which it is at preseut not casy to define, though it was amply sufficicnt to form what was termed the Persian empire, 557, u.c. Wis castern fronticr ecrtainly touched the verge of India; but whether it encroached yct farther, is a matter of doubt, aud has been so for centurics. Nor is it even an established point where India itself terminated ; for although Elphinstone aud enjoyed by India at a very carly period. With regard to Semiramis, recent discoveries of ruins and de- ciphering of inscriptions have placed her existence as an historical personage beyond a doubt. + The invasion of Scsostris, king of Egypt, a... 3023, is alleged to have been as successful as that of Seniramis had proved disastrous. Desiring to render his subjects a commercial people, he fitted out a fleet of 100 ships in the Arabian Gulf, or Red Sea (being the inventor, it is alleged, of ships of war), by means of which all the countries stretching along the lry- threan or Arabian Seato India were subjugated, Mean- while he Icd his army through Asia, and being every- where victorious, crossed the Ganges and advanced to the Indian Ocean. He spent nine years in this expedition, but exacted no other tokens of submis- sion from the conquered nations than the sending annually of presents to Egypt. Verhaps this story, recorded by Diodorus Siculus, and quoted by Harris and by Robertson (who discredits it), in his Zésto- rical Disquisition concerning Ancient India, p. 6, may hare originated in the efforts of Sesostris for the extension of commerce; but the success of his plans, whether pursued by warlike or peaceful means, could have been at best but short-lived, since, after his death the Igyptians relapsed into their previous anti-maritime habits; and centuries elapsed before their direct trade with India became of importance. { The Greek accounts of Herenles haying been in India is thought to have arisen from the fact of there having been a native prince of that name, who, according to the Hindoo traditions cited by Diodorus Siculus (who wrote 44, B.c.), was after his death honoured as a god, having in life excelled all mere men in strength and courage; cleared both the sea and land of monsters and wild beasts; founded many cities, the most famous of which was Velibothra, where he built a stately palace strongly fortified, and rendered impregnable by being surrounded hy deep trenches, into which he let an adjacent river. When his numerous sons were grown up, he divided India equally among them; und they reigned long and happily, but never engaged in any foreign expe- ditions, or sent forth colonies into distant countries, being content with the resources of their own fertile domains. § Arrian’s Indica: Straho, lib. xv.; Elphinstone, vol,i., p. 440. "Tsalah; chap. xliv., v. 28. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com ———— 20 DARIUS CODOMANUS OF PERSIA PIMLIP OF MACIEDON—..c. 337, other writers follow Strabo in declaring the Indus, from the mountains to the sea, to have formed its western limit, other autho- rities consider the territory of the Hindoos to have stretched far beyond. Colonel Wil- ford adduces a verse in their Sacred Writ- ings, which prohibits the three upper, or “ twice-born” classes, from crossing the In- dus, hut says that they were at hberty to | pass to the other side, by going round its source.* Amid so many difficulties and con- tradictory statements, it is only possible to note the points which scem most reasonable and best authenticated. Darius, the son of Hystaspes, was raised to the throne of Persia, B.c. 521, by the seven nobles who conspired against Gomates, the Magian, by whom it had been usurped aftcr the death of Cambyses, the son and successor of Cyrus, whose daughter Atossa he afterwards married. Desiring to know the termination of the Indus, and the state of the adjacent countries, with a view to their conquest, Darius built a fleet at Cas- patyrus, in the territory of Pactyica on that river, which he entrusted to a skilful Greek mariner named Scylax, who fulfilled his in- structions by sailing down the whole length of the Indus, thence coasting to the straits of Bah-el-Mandeb, and ascending the Arabian gulf to the port at its northern extremity. The account given by Scylax of the fertility, high cultivation, and dense population of the country through which his route lay, incited Darius at once to attempt its acquisi- tion. By the aid of the Tyriaus, who were intimately acquainted with the navigation, he brought a numerons force on the coast, while he himself headed a land attack. According to Dr. Robertson, he subjugated “ the districts watered by the Indus ;’+ while Colonel Chesney speaks of his conquests as limited to the “ Indian territory westward of the Indus.{” Both appear to rely exclu- sively on the testimony of Herodotus, who states that ‘the Indians” consented to pay an aunual tribute of 360 Eubean talents of * Asiatic Rescarehes, vol. vi., p. 585. + Dr. Robertson’s Wistorical Disquisition, p. 12. t Colonel Chesney’s Survey of the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates. London: 1850; vol. ii, p. 180. § Herodotus, lib. iii. and iv. ) || During the reign of Artaxerxes, the third son of | Nerxes (the Ahasuerus of the book of Msther), Ctesias, the king’s physieian, and the author of a voluminous history of the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Tersian empires, wrote a book on India, founded upon the aceounts he obtained from the Persians. Ifis works | | are not now extant though various extraets are to be Sri Satguru Jagjit Singh Ji eLibrary gold, or a talent a day—the Persian year being then considered to comprise only 360 days. The sum would appear to be over- stated; for a single talent, at the lowest computation, was equal to £3,000 English money ; and even, though India may have then deserved its high reputation as a gold- producing region, this tax would have been very onerous. at this time the force of Persian gold was known and feared by neighbouring states, and had a powerful share in enabling the successors of Darius to keep together the chief part of the widely-scattered dominions, which he displayed great ability in even par- tially consolidating and dividing into satra- pies, or governments; of these his Indian possessions formed the twenticth and last.§ It is, however, ecrtain, that Xerxes, the son and suecessor of Darius, had a body of Indian troops in his service ; bnt he discouraged maritime intercourse, considering traflic by land more desirable; and indeed he and his suecessors are said to have adopted the Babylonian policy of pre- yenting invasions by sea, by blocking np the navigation of some of the chief rivers, in- stead of guarding the coast with an efficient naval force. We find but few traces of India|] during the remaining reigns of the Persian mo- narchs, nntil the time of their last ruler, Darins Codomanns, who suceceded to the sway of a disorganized territory, consisting of mumerous provinces, or rather kingdoms, differing in religion, languages, laws, cus- toms, and interests; and bound together by no tie of a permanent character. A power- fal enemy was at hand, in the neighbouring kingdom of Macedon, which had sprung into importance almost as rapidly as Persia, and in a similar manner, having been raised by the talents of a single individual. Philp had acceded to the government of an ordmary state, weakened by war and dissension ; but taking full advantage of the commanding | seographical position of the country, and the warlike spirit of its hardy sons, he ren- found in different authors. They are all unfavour- ably commented on, especially that on India, by se- yeral Greek writers, who pronounce them fabulous, Plutareh, Aristotle, and even Strabo, notwithstand- ing their severe censures, haye, however, not serupicd to borrow from the pages of Ctesias sueh statements as appeared to them probable; and Diodorus, as well as Herodotus and Athenrus, are said to have drawn largely from the same source. Xenophon, who was personally aequainted with Ctesias, speaks of him with great respect, though differing from many of his opiniuns. NamdhariElibrary@gmail.com ALEXANDER CROSSES THE dered it the centre of ar tik and OC cow sccond only to Persia in power, and snpe- rior even to Persia in infiuence, on account of the state of corruption and excessive Iuxury into which that empire had fallen. The free Grecian republies, weakened by strife and division, beeame for the most part suhjeet to Macedonia, whose ancient consti- tution——a limited monarchy, which it was the interest of the community at large to maintain— proved a source of streugth alike in offensive and defensive warfare. Still Macedonia appears to have heen in some sort tributary to Persia; and it was pos- sibly a dispute on this point which had ted Phihp to form the hostile intentions he was preparing to carry out, and which