1 1-4 Captain Tot/s Comments on a Sanscrit Inscription. 



When captured at length, and the prince slain, the unfortunate Moghul 

 chief, MuHAMMED, was brought wounded before Alla. The King taunt- 

 ingly asking how he would shew his gratitude, if he caused his wounds to 

 be cured, was answered, in a spirit that showed how worthy he was of the 

 protection which he had received, and which ended so fatally to his friend, 

 " I would put you to death, and make the son of Hammir my sovereign." 



In 1808 my travels led me by this famed place. 1 reached the gate of 

 Mddhupur, the fortified city in the mountains, through which a road leads 

 to tlie fort, but was denied entrance. I marched, through a narrow valley, 

 sixteen miles, between high perpendicular rocks, its breadth seldom, to my 

 recollection, one liundred yards, and which merely brought me to another 

 gate of Mnd/iupiir, three miles opposite the former. At the foot I ascended 

 a rock, from which I was told I should have a view of the walls of the for- 

 tress, but was disappointed, and with difficulty descended. I then marched 

 about eight miles to the westward of the hills, and had a slight view of 

 merely the tops of the edifices of Rinthambhur, which now belongs to 

 Jajjapur. 



In the most remote parts of India I have found traces of Alla ; and one 

 inscription in Sanscrit, apparently set up at his command. He was one of 

 the greatest of the sovereigns India ever had. He reduced every part of 

 Hindust'hdn ; and while he was constantly engaged in repelling irruptions 

 of the Moghuls, he cultivated, at the same time, the arts of peace. Ferishta 

 gives an outline of his administration of government, which was then con- 

 sulted as the Kamin Alldhi. 



There are metrical legends of the wars of Alla with all those principa- 

 lities ; but this paper is already too prolonged to touch even on these. 

 The Haras, the Khkhis of central India, possess all the bravery of the 

 C/iohdn race, of which they are conspicuous branches; and Hammir, men- 

 tioned in our Inscription, as having, conjointly with Kilhan, overcome the 

 foe of Prithwiraja, was the great forefather of the Hara race, and is 

 mentioned as such in their domestic annals, as well as in the works of 

 Chand. There are twenty-four ramifications (jsdc'hds), saciE, or tribes of 

 the Cli6lidn race, but several of them are now extinct, and others but little 

 known ; I possess, however, several memorials of them. 



Those brilliant periods in their history, when petty isolated chieftains 

 defied for a time the efforts of the Empire, are recorded, some of theiji in 

 poems of merit, and are never-ending themes to the erratic scald of 



