Page images
PDF
EPUB

Indian prince-given only to those who have been submissive and loyal to England or who have rendered the Crown a distinguished service. He is commonly called Maharajah Ram Singh. When he wrote his name on his photograph he signed simply Ram Singh. He is forty-four years of age. His territory is 15,250 square miles, supporting a population of nearly two millions, and yielding a revenue of about $24,000,000 annually.

Rama was son of the King
Deity. A king who lived

In the literature of India there are two poems-the "Iliad " and "Odyssey" of Hindostan-known as the "Mahábárata and the "Rámáyana." These poems tell of the exploits of princes of a lunar race, and princes of a solar race. The great prince of the solar race was Rama. of Oude, and an incarnation of the near him had a beautiful daughter. He promised to bestow this daughter upon the prince who could bend the bow with which the god Shiva had destroyed the other gods. Rama broke the bow and won the beautiful princess. Rama was to have ascended the throne. His father had among his wives one who was anxious for her son to succeed, and she induced the father to banish Rama and give preference to her own son. This is worth noting as among the disadvantages of polygamy. So Rama wandered off. The King of Ceylon had a sister who fell in love with Rama, and asked him to desert the beautiful princess for whom he had bent the bow of the gods. Rama disdained the overture, and punished the lady by cutting off her ears and nose. Out of revenge a relative of the mutilated and despised Ceylon princess was induced to carry away the beautiful wife of Rama. The miscreant who performed this office, a monster with ten heads and twenty arms, came in the shape of a beggar, and carried off the princess in his chariot through the air to Ceylon. Rama raised an army and marched upon Ceylon. Battles were fought and the princess recovered, and her purity was established by the ordeal of fire. This ordeal was witnessed by three hundred and thirty millions of gods, and the beautiful princess coming out unscathed, the poem ended in the happiness and triumph of Rama.

It is well to know something about your friends before you

[graphic]

19 we rooted this information about Rama out of because from Rama the Maharajah of Jeypore

He traces his own line back to 967, to Dhola la Rai was thirty-fourth in descent from Rama. od deal about good blood and long descent and tors, but here is a prince whose line goes back sand years, and then rises into the heavens and verse among its progenitors. Something must be ndian imagination and the necessities of verse. which tells of the adventures of Rama and his posed to tell the story of the invasion of Southern Aryans, one of the earliest events in Indian hisonsequence the Maharajah of Jeypore may fairly the most ancient families in the world. Among was Jai Singh II., a prince remarkable for his ecially in astronomy and mathematics. Jai Singh he city of Jeypore. The present Maharajah has a warm friend of the English, and when the Prince e to see him he expended $500,000 in entertaining ghness. We left Agra about noon, the day being pressive. Our ride was through a low, uninterestbroken by ranges of hills. The railway is narrow s I learned from one of the managers, who accoms proved a success, and strengthens the arguments e narrow-gauge system. It was night before we On arriving at the station the Maharajah with his ministers, and the English resident, Dr. o acted in place of Colonel Beynon. As the Gened, the Maharajah, who wore the ribbon and star - of India, advanced and shook hands, welcoming minions. The Maharajah is a small, rather fragile a serious, almost a painful, expression of counteà intelligent, keen face. He looked like a man of movements were slow, impassive-the movements This may be a mannerism, however, for on studyyou could see that there is some youth in it. On re the crimson emblems of his caste-the warrior

pore.

caste of Rajpootana. His Highness does not speak English, although he understands it, and our talk was through an interpreter. After the exchange of courtesies and a few moments' conversation, the General drove off to the English residency, accompanied by a company of Jeypore cavalry. The residency is some distance from the station. It is a fine, large mansion, surrounded by a park and garden.

It was arranged that we should visit Amber, the ancient capital of Jeypore, one of the most curious sights in India. Amber was the capital until the close of the seventeenth century. It was among the freaks of the princes who once reigned in India that when they tired of a capital or a palace they wandered off and built a new one, leaving the other to run to waste. The ruins of India are as a general thing the abandoned palaces and temples of kings who grew weary of their toy and craved another. This is why Amber is now an abandoned town and

[ocr errors]

Jeypore the capital. If the Maharajah were to tire of Jeypore and return to Amber, the town would accompany him, for without the court the town would die. Traveling in India must be done early in the morning, and although we had had a severe day's journey, we left for Amber at seven in the morning. A squadron of the Maharajah's cavalry accompanied us. They are fine horsemen and wear quilted uniforms of printed cotton. In India one way of keeping cool is to quilt yourself with cotton. On my observing that soldiers under an Indian sun,

[graphic]

swathed in quilted cotton, must be very uncomfortable, I was

told that the Indian found heavy apparel an advantage, and

[blocks in formation]

Englishmen when hunting wore sporting dresses on the same principle. Our drive through Jeypore was interesting from the fact that we were now in a native city, under native rule. Heretofore the India we had seen was India under Englishmen; but Jeypore is sovereign, with power of life and death over his own subjects. The city is purely Oriental, and is most picturesque and striking. There are two or three broad streets and one or two squares that would do no discredit to Paris. The architecture is Oriental, and, as all the houses are painted after the same pattern in rose color, it gives you the impression that it is all the same building. The streets had been cleaned and swept for our coming, and men, carrying goatskins of water, were sprinkling them. Soldiers were stationed at various points to salute, and sometimes the salute was accompanied with a musical banging on various instruments of the national air. The best that India can do for a distinguished American is "God save the Queen." I was amused in Bombay, on the occasion of a state dinner to General Grant, at the distress of one of our friends at the Government House because his band could not play any American national air. There was to be a toast to the country, and of course as the toast was drinking the band would play. But what to play? The "StarSpangled Banner," "Hail Columbia,' "Yankee Doodle?" They had never been heard of in India. When the dinner came and the toast was drunk, the band played a snatch or two from a German waltz, and our company all stood gravely until it was done, under the impression that it was the national American air, and feeling, I have no doubt, that we must be a giddy people to create a national hymn out of dancing music. The best the Jeypore bands can do for the General is "God save the Queen;" and, happily, it makes no difference to the person for whom the honor is meant, as he does not know one tune from another, and believed, no doubt, with his English friends at Bombay, that the dance music was the real anthem.

[ocr errors]

We note as we drive through Jeypore that there are gas lamps. This is a tremendous advance in civilization. One of the first things we heard in India was that in Jeypore lived a

great prince, a most enlightened prince, quite English in his ideas, who had gas lamps in his streets. Wherever we stopped this was told us, until we began to think of the Maharajah not as a prince descended from the gods, but a ruler who had gas lamps in his streets. We are told also that he has a theater almost ready. There is a troupe of Parsee players in town, who have come all the way from Bombay and are waiting to open it. The Maharajah was sorry that he could not show the General a play, but his theater was not finished. What strikes us vividly is not the gas in the streets or the theater, but the Indian aspect. It is all so new and strange that the gas lamps seem to be out of place. These long streets of rose-colored houses, with turrets and verandas and latticed windows, that look so warm and picturesque and glowing-this is what your fancy told you might be seen in India. The bazaars, in which dealers are crouching; the holy men and ascetics covered with ashes; the maidens, with green and scarlet drapery, carrying huge water pitchers on their heads; the beggars; the brown, naked children rolling in the earth; the calico-covered soldiers, and the odd costumes, the marks of rank and caste-from the holy Brahmin, who belongs to a sacred race, down to the waterbearers and scavengers-all this is new and strange. An attendant leads a cheetah along the street, and you shudder for a moment at the idea of a wild menagerie animal being at large; but you learn that the cheetah is quite a harmless animal when tamed, and good for hunting. We come to the edge of the town, which suddenly ends, and are in a valley. The hills are covered with a brown furze, which looks as if it would crackle and break under the burning sun. The roads are lined with cactus, and the fields are divided by mud fences which would not last a week in our rainy regions. We pass gardens -walled gardens with minarets. Here the ladies of the Hindoo gentleman's house may take their recreation, but their life is seclusion. The camels pass us carrying heavy burdens, and the trees are alive with monkeys. The monkey is a sacred animal, and no Hindoo would take its life. Monkeys skip over walls and sit on the trees and watch us as we pass. I do

« PreviousContinue »