United States or Lithuania ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
At the end of another decade an army of Mahrattas took possession, and completed the spoilation by ripping the silver filigree-work off the ceiling of the Throne-room. Not long after this, yet another adventurer took a hand in the work of destruction, tortured the members of the imperial family, and put out the eyes of the helpless old emperor, Shah Alum.
Having a hereditary feud against the Mahrattas and a hereditary claim, such as it was, to the fortress of Gwalior, then in Sindhia's hands, he seemed to Hastings a useful instrument for causing a diversion.
I saw only a few villages and a single small town inhabited by Mahrattas, whose appearance is as needy and dirty as those near Kundalla. From the village where we left the carriage we had still three miles to go to the temples.
I except from this the Ranna of Gohud.... Leave him to settle his own affairs with the Mahrattas." That the said Anderson appears very assiduously to have sought for grounds to justify the execution of this part of his instructions, to which, however, he was at all events obliged to conform.
The next afternoon, when about to halt, General Wellesley learned that the Mahrattas were encamped about six miles from him, on the banks of the Kaitna. He determined to attack them at once, without waiting for Colonel Stephenson; for in another day they would, in all probability, send off their infantry, and begin to carry on a desultory warfare with their horse.
Thus probably half the Sudras of the present day were at some more or less remote period Panchamas. Again, during periods of great civil commotion, as in the 18th century, when brute force was supreme, not a few Panchamas, especially low-caste Mahrattas, made their way to the front as soldiers of fortune, and even carved out kingdoms to themselves at the point of the sword.
As allies of both parties they were clearly at liberty to throw in their help against the common enemies of both, especially when these chanced to be their own enemies also. The Mahrattas were the foes of all rulers on that side of India; and the Rohillas were either in collusion with the Mahrattas or unable to oppose them.
That these considerations were urged by Mr. Anderson to the said Warren Hastings, in his letter of the 24th of June, 1781, and were enforced by this additional argument, "that, in point of policy, I believe, it ought not to be our wish that the Mahrattas should ever recover the fortress of Gualior. It forms an important barrier to our own possessions.
On the Nizam's side, besides a vast force of horse and foot of the ordinary Asiatic kind, there were no less than 17,000 infantry under Raymond, backed by a large force of regular cavalry and artillery. The Mahrattas had 10,000 regulars under Perron, 5,000 under Filose, 3,000 under Hessing, 4,500 under du Drenec and Boyd.
VI. That, so great was the confidence of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân in the just, humane, and liberal feelings of Englishmen, as to "lull him into an inactivity" of the most essential detriment to his interests: since, "in the hopes which he entertained from the interposition of our government," he declined the invitation of the Mogul to join the arms of his Majesty and the Mahrattas, "refused any connection with the Seiks," and did even neglect to take the obvious precaution of crossing the Ganges, as he had originally intended, while the river was yet fordable, a movement that would have enabled him certainly to baffle all pursuit, and probably "to keep the Vizier in a state of disquietude for the remainder of his life."
Word Of The Day