Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v2.c27.s7.t3.31

v2.c27.s7.t3.31

All these atrocities occurred within six months after my visit to this court, and about eighteen from the time it was received into protective alliance with the British Government. The anomalous condition of all our connexions with the Rajput States has already been described : and if illustration of those remarks be required, it is here in awful characters. We had tied up our own hands : “ internal interference ” had been renounced, and the sequestration of every merchant’s property, who was connected with the Mehta faction, and the exile of the nobles, had no limit but the will of a bloodthirsty and vindictive tyrant. The objects of his persecution made known everywhere the unparalleled hardships of their case, and asserted that nothing but respect for the British Government prevented their doing themselves justice. In no part of the past history of this State could such proscription of the majority of the kin and clan of the prince have taken place. The dread of our intervention, as an umpire favourable to their chief, deprived them of hope ; they knew that if we were exasperated there was no saran to protect them. They had been more than twelve months in this afflicting condition when I left the country ; nor have I heard that anything has been done to relieve them, or to adjust these intestine broils. It is abandoning them to that spirit of revenge which is a powerful ingredient in their nature, and held to be justifiable by any means when no other hope is left them. In all human probability, Raja Man will end his days by the same expedient which secured him from the fury of his predecessor.¹