CHAPTER 1

Udaipur, January 29, 1820.—The Personal Narrative attached to the second volume of this work terminated with the Author’s return to Udaipur, after a complete circuit of Marwar and Ajmer. He remained at his headquarters at Udaipur until the 29th January 1820, when circumstances rendering it expedient that he should visit the principalities of Bundi and Kotah (which were placed under his political superintendence), he determined not to neglect the opportunity it afforded of adding to his portfolio remarks on men and manners, in a country hitherto untrodden by Europeans.

Although we had not been a month in the valley of Udaipur, we were all desirous to avail ourselves of the lovely weather which the cold season of India invariably brings, and which exhilarates the European who has languished through the hot winds, and the still more oppressive monsoon. The thermometer at this time, within the valley, was at the freezing point at break of day, ranging afterwards as high as 90°, whilst the sky was without a cloud, and its splendour at night was dazzling.

Kheroda.

We passed the sarai of Surajpura, a mile to the right, and got entangled in the swampy ground of Bhartewar. This town, which belongs to the chief of Kanor, one of the sixteen great barons of Mewar, boasts a high antiquity, and Bhartrihari, the elder brother of Vikrama, is its reputed founder. If we place any faith in local tradition, the bells of seven hundred and fifty temples, chiefly of the Jain faith, once sounded within its walls, which were six miles in length; but few vestiges of them now remain, although there are ruins of some of these shrines which show they were of considerable importance. Within a mile and a half of Kheroda we passed through Khairsana, a large charity-village belonging to the Brahmans.

Kheroda is a respectable place, having a fortress with double ditches, which can be filled at pleasure from the river. Being situated on the highroad between the ancient and modern capitals, it was always a bone of contention in the civil wars. It was in the hands of Rawat Jai Singh of Lawa, the adopted heir of Sangram Saktawat, one of the great leaders in the struggles of the year 1748 [A.D. 1691], an epoch as well known in Mewar as the 1745 of Scotland. Being originally a fiscal possession, and from its position not to be trusted to the hands of any of the feudal chiefs, it was restored to the sovereign; though it was not without difficulty that the riever of Lawa agreed to sign the constitution of the 4th of May,[[2]] and relinquish to his sovereign a stronghold which had been purchased with the blood of his kindred.

Tribal Feuds.

Agriculture at Kheroda.

Of the siyalu crop, which consists of makkai, or Indian corn, and juar and bajra, or millet, with the different pulses, the process of distribution is as follows. From every khalla, or heap of one hundred maunds, forty are set apart for the Raj or government, and the rest, after deducting the seranas of the village-establishment, goes to the cultivator.

On the culture of sugar-cane, cotton, indigo, opium, tobacco, til or sesamum, and [597] the various dyes, there has always been a fixed money-rent, varying from two to ten rupees per bigha.