Long Reigns of Rājput Princes.
Could the same prophetic steel which carved upon the pillar of Brahmsar the destinies of the grandson of the deified Hari, eleven hundred years before Christ, have subjoined to that of Jaisal the fate which awaited his descendant Mulraj, he would doubtless have regarded the prophecy as conveying a falsehood too gross for belief. That the offspring of the deified prince of Dwarka, who founded Ghazni, and fought the [270] united kings of Syria and Bactria, should, at length, be driven back on India, and compelled to seek shelter under the sign of the cross, reared amidst their sand-hills by a handful of strangers, whose ancestors, when they were even in the maturity of their fame, were wandering in their native woods, with painted bodies, and offering human sacrifices to the sun-god—more resembling Balsiva than Balkrishna—these would have seemed prodigies too wild for faith.
[1]. Nunkaran had three sons, Harraj, Maldeo, and Kalyandas; each had issue. Harraj had Bhim (who succeeded his grandfather Nunkaran). Maldeo had Ketsi, who had Dayaldas, father of Sabal Singh, to whom was given in appanage the town of Mandila, near Pokaran. The third son, Kalyandas, had Manohardas, who succeeded Bhim. Ramchand was the son of Manohardas. A slip from the genealogical tree will set this in a clear light.
[2]. [About 75 miles N.W. of Jodhpur city.]
[3]. Another synchronism (see Annals of Marwar for an account of Nahar Khan) of some value, since it accounts for the first abstraction of territory by the Rathors from the Bhattis.
[4]. The Gara is invariably called the Bias in the chronicle. Gara, or Ghara, is so called, in all probability, from the mud (gar) suspended in its waters. The Gara is composed of the waters of the Bias and Sutlej. [See IGI, vii. 139, xxiii. 179.]
[5]. [About 60 miles S. of Jaisalmer city.]
[6]. [A.D. 1669-95.]
[7]. The most essential use to which my labours can be applied is that of enabling the British Government, when called upon to exercise its functions, as protector and arbitrator of the international quarrels of Rajputana, to understand the legitimate and original grounds of dispute. Here we perceive the germ of the border-feuds, which have led to so much bloodshed between Bikaner and Jaisalmer, in which the former was the first aggressor; but as the latter, for the purpose of redeeming her lost territory, most frequently appeals as the agitator of public tranquillity, it is necessary to look for the remote cause in pronouncing our award.