Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v3.c42.s2.t1.156

v3.c42.s2.t1.156

Thus matters proceeded till November 1819, when the death of the Maharao Ummed Singh engendered new feelings in the claimants to the succession, and placed the regent in a position from which not even his genius might have extricated him, unaided by the power whose alliance he had so timely obtained. And here it becomes requisite to advert to the terms of this alliance. The treaty¹ was concluded at Delhi, on the 26th of December 1817, by the envoys of the regent, in the name of his lawful sovereign, the Maharao Ummed Singh, ratified by the contracting parties, and the deeds were interchanged at the regent's court early in January. To this treaty his sovereign's seal and his own were appended; but no guarantee of the regent's power was demanded pending the negotiation, nor is he mentioned except in the preamble, and then only as the ministerial agent of the Maharao Ummed Singh, in whose behalf alone the treaty was virtually executed. This excited the surprise of the British representative,² who, in his official dispatch detailing the progress and conclusion of the negotiations, intimated that he not only expected such stipulation, but was prepared for admitting it. There was no inadvertence in this omission; the regent saw no occasion for any guarantee, for the plenary exercise of the powers of sovereign during more than half a century had constituted him, *de facto*, prince of Kotah. Moreover, we may suppose had he felt a desire for such stipulation, that a feeling of pride might have stifled its expression, which by making the choice of ministers dependent on a foreign power would have virtually annulled the independent sovereignty of Kotah. Whatever was the reason of the omission, at a season when his recognition might have had the same formal sanction of all the parties as the other articles of the treaty, it furnished the future opponents of the regent's power with a strong argument against its maintenance in perpetuity on the death of the Maharao Ummed Singh.