Part 43 (1/2)
6. This story may be an adaptation of the similar Buddhist tale.
7. uj is the Og, King of Bashan, of the Hebrew version of the legend.
The extravagant stories quoted in the text are not in the Koran, but are the inventions of the commentators. Sale gives references in his notes to chap. 5 of the Koran.
8. The kingdom included the modern Oudh (Awadh). The capital was the ancient city, also named Ajodhya, adjoining Fyzabad, which is still a very sacred place of pilgrimage.
9. It is, I think, absolutely impossible for the most sympathetic European to understand, or enter into, the mental position of the learned and devout Hindoo who implicitly believes the wild myth related in the text, and sees no incongruity in the congeries of inconsistent ideas which are involved in the story. We may dimly apprehend that Brahma is conceived as a [Greek text], or Architect of the Universe, working in subordination to an impersonal higher power, and not as the infinite, omniscient, omnipotent Creator whom the Hebrews reverenced, but we shall still be a long way from attaining the Hindoo point of view. The relations of Krishna, Vishnu, Brahma, Rama, Siva, and all the other deities, with one another and with mankind, seem to be conceived by the Hindoo in a manner so confused and contradictory that every attempt at elucidation or explanation must necessarily fail. A Hindoo is born, not made, and the 'inwardness' of Hinduism is not to be penetrated, even by the most learned of 'barbarian' pundits.
10. _Ante_, chapter 20, note 6.
11. Raja of Bharatpur, not to be confounded with the Lion of the Panjab.
12. Wordsworth, _Excursion_, Book I.
13. The original edition gives a coloured plate of this tomb, which is not noticed by Fergusson. That author's remarks on the palace at Dig would apply to this tomb also; the style is good, but not quite the best. Suraj Mall was killed in a skirmish in 1763.
14. Baldeo, or in Sanskrit Baladeva, Balabhadra, or Balarama, was the elder brother of Krishna. His myth in some respects resembles that of Herakles, as that of Krishna is related to the myths of Apollo. The editor is not able to solve the queries propounded by the author.
15. i.e. Hari deva, a form of Vishnu. The temple of Hari deva at Govardhan was built about A.D. 1560. (_N.W.P. Gazetteer_, 1st ed., vol. viii, p. 94.)
16. Modern India shows little appreciation of good art, and the paintings ordinarily executed for decorative purposes are as crude as those described by the author. A school of clever artists in Bengal is doing something to raise the public taste. The high merit of the ancient Indian paintings at Ajanta and elsewhere is now fully recognized. A great revival of pictorial art took place about A.D.
1570 in the reign of Akbar. From that date the Indo-Persian and Indian schools of painting maintained a high standard of excellence, especially in portraiture, for a century approximately. During the eighteenth century marked deterioration may be observed. See _A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon_, Oxford, 1911.
17. The Jats detest Brahmans. The members of a Jat deputation complained one day to the editor when in the Muzaffarnagar district that they suffered many evils by reason of the Brahmans.
18. The author's meaning seems to be that building tombs is not an old Hindoo usage.
19. Sivaji, the indomitable opponent of Aurangzeb in the Deccan, belonged to the agricultural Kunbi caste. He was born in May A.D.
1627, and died in April 1680. The Brahman ministers of the Rajas of Satara were known by the t.i.tle of Peshwa. Baji Rao I, who died in 1740, the second Peshwa, was the first who superseded in actual power his nominal master. The last of the Peshwas was Baji Rao II, who abdicated in 1818, after the termination of the great Maratha war, and retired to Bithur near Cawnpore. His adopted son was the notorious Nana Sahib. The Marquis of Hastings, in 1818, drew the Raja of Satara from captivity, and re-established his dignity and power.
In 1839 the Raja's treachery compelled the Government of India to depose him. His territory is now a district of the Bombay Presidency.
See Mankar, _The Life and Exploits of s.h.i.+vaji_, 2nd ed., Bombay, Nirnayasagar Press, 1886.
20. The Raja of Berar, also known as the Raja of Nagpur, was called the Bhonsla. The misrule of Gwalior has been described _ante_, in chapters 36 and 49. The condition of Gwalior and Indore, the capitals of Sindhia and Holkar respectively, is now very different. The Bhonsla has vanished.
21. Since the annexation of the Panjab in 1849, the Sikhs have justly earned so much praise as loyal and gallant soldiers, the flower of the Indian army, that their earlier less honourable reputation has been effaced, Captain Francklin, writing in 1803, and apparently expressing the opinion of George Thomas, declares that 'the Seiks are false, sanguinary, and faithless; they are addicted to plunder and the acquirement of wealth by any means, however nefarious'.
(_Military Memoirs of Mr. George Thomas, London reprint_, p. 112.) The Sikh states of the Panjab are now sufficiently well governed.
22. I know of no authority for the name Charat (Churut), which seems to be a blunder for Satrughna. The sons of Dasaratha were Rama, by the chief queen; Bharat, by a second; and Lachhman (Lakshmana), and Satrughna by a third consort.
23. The species referred to is the long-tailed monkey called 'Hanuman', and 'langur' in Hindi, the _Presbytis entellus_ of Jerdon (=_P. anchises_, Elliot; = _Semnopithecus_, Cuvier).
24. The author seems to have forgotten that he has already told this story, _ante_, this chapter following [8] in the text.
25. It is in the Mathura district. The town of Mathura (Muttra) became the head-quarters of a separate District in 1832. The official at Govardhan in 1836 must, therefore, have been subordinate to Mathura, not to Agra.
CHAPTER 57
Veracity.