[38]. At this juncture an officer of Holkar’s, Harnath Chela, on passing through Bansain, had some camels carried off by the Bhils of the Satola estate. Harnath summoned Gulab Singh Chondawat, who came with eight of his relatives, when he was told he should be detained till the cattle were restored; and in the morning, as the Mahratta mounted his elephant, he commanded the Raghaut chieftain to be seized. Gulab drew his sword and made at Harnath, but his sword broke in the howda, when he plunged his dagger into the elephant; but at length he and all his relations, who nobly plied their swords on the Mahrattas, were cut to pieces.
[39]. [For a graphic account of these camps see T. D. Broughton, Letters written in a Mahratta Camp during the year 1809, ed. 1892.]
[40]. The Rana of Gohad and Gwalior, the Khichi chiefs of Raghugarh and Bahadurgarh, and the Nawab of Bhopal, made common cause with us in Warren Hastings’ time. The first three possess not a shadow of independence; the last fortunately formed a link in our own policy, and Lord Hastings, in 1818, repaid with liberal interest the services rendered to the government of Warren Hastings in 1782. It was in his power, with equal facility, to have rescued all the other States, and to have claimed the same measure of gratitude which Bhopal is proud to avow. But there was a fatality in the desire to maintain terms with Sindhia, whose treachery to our power was overlooked.
[41]. The author, then a subaltern, was attached to the suite of the ambassador, Mr. Græme Mercer. He left the subsidiary force at Gwalior in December 1805, and the embassy reached Sindhia’s court in the spring of 1806, then encamped amidst the ruins of Mewar.
[42]. The ministers of Sindhia were Ambaji, Bapu Chitnavis, Madhuba Huzuria, and Anaji Bhaskar.
[43]. [Baiza Bāi, widow of Daulat Rāo Sindhia, who died in 1827, was an unscrupulous, designing woman, whose intrigues at Gwalior forced her to take refuge in British territory. She returned after an interval and lived at Gwalior until her death in 1862 (IGI, xii. 424).]
[44]. That is, chief of the race from which issued the Satara sovereigns, whose minister, the Peshwa, accounted Sindhia and Holkar his feudatories.
[45]. Rangra is an epithet applied to the Rajputs, implying turbulent, from rana, ‘strife.’ [Rāngar is the title of a body of turbulent, predatory Muhammadans, who claim Rājput descent, occupying parts of the E. Panjāb and W. districts of the Ganges-Jumna Duāb. The derivation suggested is very doubtful (Crooke, Tribes and Castes, N.W.P. and Oudh, v. 227 ff.).]
[46]. [In October 1805 (Grant Duff 601).]
[47]. [Jean Baptiste de la Fontaine Filoze (1775-1840) assisted in the campaign against Thomas in 1801. In the war with the English, part of his brigade under Dupont was defeated at Assaye. He was afterwards ill-treated by Sindhia, but was reinstated. Some of his descendants are still in Sindhia’s service (Compton, European Military Adventurers, 352 ff.; Sleeman, Rambles, 115, note). He is frequently mentioned in Broughton, Letters written in a Mahratta Camp.]