Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v2.c28.189

v2.c28.189

Death of Rāo Udai Singh.—Udai Singh died thirteen years after his inauguration on the cushion of Jodha, and thirty-three after the death of Maldeo. The manner of his death, as related in the biographical sketches termed Khyat, affords such a specimen of superstition and of Rajput manners that it would be improper to omit it. The narrative is preceded by some reflections on the moral education of the Rathor princes, and the wise restraints imposed upon them under the vigilant control of chiefs of approved worth and fidelity; so that, to use the words of the text, “they often passed their twentieth year, ignorant of woman.” If the “fat raja” had ever known this moral restraint, in his riper years he forgot it; for although he had no less than twenty-seven queens, he cast the eye of desire on the virgin-daughter of a subject, and that subject a Brahman.