Maharbal

“ My daughter, these words are written by the hand of my scribe and friend, Silenus, but they will be sealed with my signet, which thou knowest, and thou canst verify the seal if so be they arrive in thy hands.
“They are sent by the hand of Maharbal, whose fidelity to me is assured. He also hath some liking for thee if I be not mistaken. Maharbal was wounded in yesterday’s action, but he is young, of great strength, and of a great courage; he may succeed in accomplishing the journey. ”

“ But the gods are my judges, and if thou wilt but strike, I shall soon appear before them to answer for my conduct. Therefore, I say strike, and strike home!”
Mago did not strike. He burst into tears, and threw himself into Maharbal’s arms.
“It is mine own fault,” he cried, “oh Maharbal, and deeply do I grieve for the poor girl Eugenia. But far more deeply, friend, do I grieve for thee, upon whom the gods have laid such a cruel burden, as to compel thee, for thine honour’s sake and mine, to slay a woman. For thou hadst no other alternative, save to become a base villain.” ”

“ Maharbal is charged to deliver unto thee this letter if he be alive, and if thou be alive. He is to find thee, and not to quit thee until thou readest this letter in his presence. Should he fail in this duty of his own fault, he will lose his head. Shouldest thou cause him to fail by thine own neglect of duty, thine own life will be at stake. For as Regent and Governor of New Carthage thou hast many lives in thine hands, and thou art answerable for all to me, thy commanding officer, and through me to the State. ”

“ In attacking, look thou well to thy guard—you poets are so incautious. After striking, ever raise thy wrist and cover thyself again before another blow. Now farewell, and the gods be with thee; return to thy troops.”
Very shortly after these orders had been given, Maharbal issued from the wood and waved his sword with the attached handkerchief twice. Like arrows Chœras and his men started from their cover, and sweeping over the plain, avoiding the flanks, fell upon the rear of the Romans. Dreadful then was the slaughter of the footmen who had retired behind the Roman cavalry. ”

“ They traversed a plain, and the horsemen of the advanced guard disappeared over the crest of a sloping hill, to the summit of which Maharbal had himself recently ascended without perceiving any danger, when suddenly the men of the advanced party were seen galloping back in disorder, while behind and among them, pursuing and striving to cut them down, was seen a large and martial body of mounted men in bright, burnished armour. From the crests of their helmets, which glittered in the morning sun, there streamed long dyed plumes of crimson horsehair. ”

“ As for me, Princess Cœcilia, thanks be to the gods! I do not share thy opinion of men, nor deem that all can be so bad. Maybe ’tis fortunate for me that I have not had thine experience. Therefore, I will continue to put my faith in Maharbal. But I have now other and weightier matters to discuss with thee. I have this very day received a lengthy despatch from mine uncle Hasdrubal, and ’tis most serious. It seemeth that the war hath not by any means gone well with him for some time past. ”

“ Maharbal replied: "The gods have not given all their gifts to one man. You know how to win victory, Hannibal, you do not how to use it." That day's delay is believed to have saved the City and the empire. The next day, as soon as it grew light, they set about gathering the spoils on the field and viewing the carnage, which was a ghastly sight even for an enemy. There all those thousands of Romans were lying, infantry and cavalry indiscriminately as chance had brought them together in the battle or the flight. ”

“ These nations, more than any other, inspired terror by the vastness of their stature and their frightful appearance: the Gauls were naked above the waist, the Spaniards had taken up their position wearing white tunics embroidered with purple, of dazzling brilliancy. The total number of infantry in the field was 40,000, and there were 10,000 cavalry. Hasdrubal was in command of the left wing, Maharbal of the right; Hannibal himself with his brother Mago commanded the centre. ”

“ Therefore, Scipio, leave thou me for ever, for I can never be thine. Things being thus, I only belong to one man living, and to him I will be true.”
Scipio stamped his foot with rage.
“Curse him!” he cried. “Curse him, by all the gods of Olympus and Hades! He needs must come between me and victory at every turn, and never more so than now. And thou art acting ill for thy country, Elissa; mark thou my word. Some day, moreover, in spite of this thrice-accursed Maharbal, thou shalt be mine whether thou wilt or no.” ”

“ So the Maharaja, receiving him in his arms, blessed his son, rejoicing in his happy fate who was the father of such a one as the world could not show the like. And in his ears the voices of prophecy made a changing music of pride and triumph. And the Maharani, overweighted with gladness, like a lily surcharged with dew, was borne to her noble couch of ivory and gold; and Prajapati watched each breath she drew, so great were her love and fear. ”

“ And when on the morrow these dreams were told to Prajapati, she rejoiced with them, no thought of envy to cloud the crystal of her soul. And when they were laid before the dream-readers, they could presage nothing but good, and being called in before the Maharaja where he sat in state with his Maharanis, they spoke as follows:
“A lord of men shall be born, a great and awful ruler. Let the soul of the Maharaja be exalted, and the heart of the Maharani rejoice and triumph, since to their house is given a son whose kingdom is the earth and the fullness of it.” ”

“ The Maharajah and Maharani always spend some months of the year at Kuch Behar, the capital of their little territory, where they have a fine estate; but during the hot weather they usually follow the example set them by English people, and go to the hills, either to Darjiling or Simla, where they mix a good deal in society. They keep up the native custom of having many members of their family to live with them, and their "house-party" is always a large one. They have several children, of whom the youngest, born soon after their return from England, is named Victor in honour of Her Majesty. ”

“ In these kingdoms of Malabar there is another sect of people called nairs, who are the gentry, and have no other duty than to carry on war, and they continually carry their arms with them, which are swords, bows, arrows, bucklers, and lances. They all live with the kings, and some of them with other lords, relations of the king, and lords of the country, and with the salaried governors; and with one another. And no one can be a nair if he is not of good lineage. They are very smart men, and much taken up with their nobility. ”

“ His Honour's aide-de-camp will follow shortly with an invitation to Government House while you remain in Bombay—which will not be many days, I don't doubt, for there is nothing in this city of plague to stop for. Later on, during your progress up country, I do myself the honour to hope that you will stay as my guests for as long as you choose at Moozuffernuggar.'
My first impulse was to answer: 'Impossible, Maharajah; we couldn't dream of accepting your kind invitation.' But on second thoughts, I remembered my duty to my proprietor. Journalism first: inclination afterwards! ”

“ My valued friend Sir Dinkar Rao informs me that, among other traditions of high Mahratta society, he has been told by aged men that the Maharaja was never known to evince serious displeasure save with cowards and men who fled in battle. ”

“ Mahabul, distinguished by valour and military skill, will march out of his city to meet the white foe. In front will be the ensigns, bells, cows’-tails, and flags, the latter painted with the bird Garura, [186] the bull of Shiva, the Bauhinia tree, the monkey-god Hanuman, the lion and the tiger, the fish, an alms-dish, and seven palm-trees. Then will come the footmen armed with fire-tubes, swords and shields, spears and daggers, clubs, and bludgeons. They will be followed by fighting men on horses and oxen, on camels and elephants. ”

“ When at last we reached Moozuffernuggar, after two days' and a night's hard travelling, we were met by a crowd of local grandees, who looked as if they had spent the greater part of their lives in brushing back their whiskers, and we drove up at once, in European carriages, to the Maharajah's palace. The look of it astonished me. It was a strange and rambling old Hindoo hill-fort, high perched on a scarped crag, like Edinburgh Castle, and accessible only on one side, up a gigantic staircase, guarded on either hand by huge sculptured elephants cut in the living sandstone. ”

“ I have seen a great deal of the native Sirdars or chiefs, especially Tej Singh who commanded the Sikh forces in the war, and of the Maharaja. The former a small, spare little man, marked with the smallpox, and with a thin and scanty beard, but sharp and intelligent, and by his own account a hero. The Maharaja is a fine, tall, portly man, with a splendid expressive face, and most gentlemanly, pleasing manner, and fine-toned voice,—altogether the most pleasing Asiatic I have seen,—to all appearance the gentlest of the gentle, and the most sincere and truthful character in the world ”

“ My son a beggar! Our race is beaten to the earth with shame.”
And standing calmly before the angry Maharaja the Blessed One after due salutation lifted his eyes and replied:
“Maharaj, this is the custom of our race.”
“This horrible thing is not so. Not one of our ancestors has ever begged his bread.”
“Maharaj, you and your high race claim descent from kings,—but my descent is far otherwise. It is from the Buddhas of ancient days, and as they have done, begging their food from the charitable, so do I, nor can I otherwise.” ”

“ There is small doubt, for instance, but that his study of the kingcraft chapters of the Mâhâbhârata had done much towards making Akbar what he was--the best ruler India has ever seen, or is likely to see; but, taking it as a whole, the tide of Mahomedan conquest had simply submerged Hindu learning, and the rising flood of Mahratta power was not one whit less prejudicial to philosophy. But below the troubled surface of wars and rumours of wars the heart of India dreamt on undisturbed. All things, as ever, were illusion. ”

“ His son moved before him, beautiful exceedingly, perfect in duty not only to his father and his foster-mother, Prajapati the fair and noble, but also to all with whom he had to do, quick to smile and reply, glad in a boy’s sports and games, and yet—apart. As a man, looking down through the clear crystal of a lake, may behold beneath it groves of strange leafage where silver fish dart and disappear in a life unknown to him, so the Maharaja, looking through the translucence of his son’s eyes uplifted to his, knew that they revealed yet hid a world in which he had no part. ”

“ There is a profound mystery always overhanging the personal affairs of the Máháráj. That mystery shrouds his birth, it shrouds his life, and I'll be bound that same mystery shrouds his death. We know that he was born in 1829, visibly of human parents; but some hundreds of thousands of his worshippers assert, on their solemn oaths, that Jivánlálji Máháráj existed ages before he was born, and that ages before that event did he carry on that amorous traffic with his fair devotees which is essential,in the Vaishnava creed, to the salvation and beatification of the degraded female soul. ”

“ Under the most favourable auspices, after the Maharajah had received a sound education and the Government of Madras had formed a high opinion of his character, Sri Sri Sri Vikrama Deo Maharajah ascended the guddi on the 27th November 1895. It was a day of very great rejoicing to the people of Jeypore to find the son of their deceased Maharajah, with all the accomplishments necessary for a ruler of a large Samastanam, placed at the head of the administration. ”

“ The Muharram is celebrated throughout the Dekhan and Malwa, with greater enthusiasm than in other parts of India. Grand preparations are made in every town on the occasion, as if for a festival of rejoicing, rather than of observing the rites of mourning, as they ought. The observance of this custom has so strong a hold on the mind of the commonalty of the Mussulmans that they believe Muhammadanism to depend merely on keeping the memory of the imáms in the above manner."—Mīr Shahāmat 'Ali, in J. R. As. Soc. xiii. 369. We find no literary quotation to exemplify the phrase as it stands. ”

“ After assuming the reins of the Samastanam, he made grand improvements to the old fort now in the occupation of the Royal Family. A temple was lately constructed by Her Highness Lakshmi Devi Rajeswari, the Dowager Maharani, at a cost of 70,000 Rupees and dedicated to the god Ramachandraswami. Be it said to the credit of the Maharajah that he opens his purse liberally to any institution that is calculated to do good to the public at large. He is not conservative, but is very liberal although he may be said to be orthodox. ”

“ Beyond the white buildings of the Maharajah of Vizianagram's palace with their high-walled gardens and cool-looking pavilions, and the {155} houses of native bankers, surrounded by orange trees laden with green fruit, and yet another temple called the Mahram Barhal, the Durga Temple appeared at last.
A young man had just brought a little black kid for sacrifice. He was dressed in tan leather shoes, a long fawn coat with a pattern on it and a small black cap on his head. He had an orange red caste mark freshly painted on his forehead, and round his shoulders hung a flower garland. ”