Extract from Akhbar (newspaper), dated Bundi, October 18, 1820.
“Warrants were sent to all the chiefs for their attendance at the capital to celebrate the festival of the Dasahra. The whole of the chiefs and landholders came, with the exception of the Thakurs of Bar, who returned the following reply:—'We have received a communication (paigham) from Sri Bhavani of Bumbaoda, who commands us no longer to put the plough in the soil, but to sell our horses and our cattle [753], and with the amount to purchase sixty-four[[28]] buffaloes and thirty-two goats, for a general sacrifice to Mataji, by obeying which we shall repossess Bumbaoda.' Accordingly, no sooner was this known, than several others joined them, both from Bundi and Kotah. The Thakur of Bar had prepared dinner near the statue of Mata for two hundred, instead of which five hundred assembled; yet not only were they all abundantly satisfied, but some food remained, which convinced the people there that the story (the communication) was true.”
This was from Bundi; but the following was from my old, steady, and faithful Brahman, Balgovind, who was actually on the spot, dated “Menal, 1st Kartik:—A few days ago, there was a grand sacrifice to Jogini Mata, when thirty-one buffaloes and fifty-three goats were slain. Upon two bakras (he-goats), three Haras tried their swords in vain; they could not touch a single hair, at which all were much surprised. These goats were afterwards turned loose to feed where they pleased, and were called amar (immortal).”
Not a comment was made upon this, either by the sensible Balgovind or the Yati Gyanji, who was with him. There was, therefore, no time to be lost in preventing an explosion from five hundred brave Haras, deeming themselves convened at the express command of Bhavani, to whom the sacrifice proved thus acceptable; and I sent to the Raja to break up the party, which was effected. It, however, shows what an easy matter it is to work upon the credulity through the feelings of these brave men.
I left the spot, hallowed by many feelings towards the silent walls of Bumbaoda. We wound our way down the rocky steep, giving a look to the ‘mother of the maids of slaughter’ as we passed, and after a short passage across the entrance of the valley, encamped in a fine grove of trees close to the town of Begun. The Rawat, descendant of ‘the black cloud,’ came out to meet me; but he is yet a stranger to the happiness that awaits him—the restoration of more than half of his estate, which has been in the hands of the Mahratta Sindhia since A.D. 1791 [754].
[1]. [Bijolia, close to the Būndi border, about 112 miles N.E. of Udaipur city (Erskine ii. A. 99 f.).]
[2]. [Sākambhari has no connexion with sākha: the name means herb-nourishing.']
[3]. [The story that Vigraharāja or Vīsaladeva, Chauhān, wrested Delhi from the Tomaras depends on doubtful authority (Smith, EHI, 387).]
[4]. [Bhīma II. Chaulukya of Gujarāt, known as Bhola, ‘the simpleton’ (A.D. 1179-1242). The statements in the text lack authority (BG, i. Part i. 195 ff.).]