Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v2.c28.s1.17

v2.c28.s1.17

by the fiend-like spirit of the king, their first thought was the preservation of their prince; the next to secure their own honour and that of their late master. The means by which they accomplished this were terrific. The females of the deceased, together with their own wives and daughters, were placed in an apartment filled with gunpowder, and the torch applied—all was soon over. This sacrifice accomplished, their sole thought was to secure a niche in that immortal temple, which the Rajput bard, as well as the great minstrel of the west, peoples with “ youths who died, to be by poets sung.” For this, the Rajput’s anxiety has in all ages been so great, as often to defeat even the purpose of revenge, his object being to die gloriously rather than to inflict death; assured that his name would never perish, but, preserved in “immortal rhyme” by the bard, would serve as the incentive to similar deeds. Accordingly, “the battle fought by the sons of Duharia¹ in the streets of Delhi” is one of the many themes of everlasting eulogy to the Rathors; and the seventh of Sravan, S. 1736 (the second month of the Monsoon of A.D. 1680), is a sacred day in the calendar of Maru.