MAHRATTAS MAIL. 



629 



Mahrattas, together with the Jats, were 200,000 

 strong. After a long ami bloody battle, the latter 

 were defeated, and lost all hopes of the supremacy 

 over India, which had been the object of the war. 

 Bujeerow died soon after. His son Maderow died 

 in 1772, his grandson Narain Row was assassinated 

 in 1773, by his uncle Ragobah. The latter could 

 not, however, obtain quiet possession of the peish- 

 wahship, for a posthumous child of Narain was 

 acknowledged for his lawful son. Ragobah offered 

 to the British the island of Salsette, on condition 

 that they should support his claims. But the council 

 of Bengal was unwilling to engage in a war with the 

 Mahrattas, and, in 1776, concluded a treaty, by the 

 terms of which Ragobah relinquished his pretensions; 

 the British were to remain in possession of Salsette, 

 and to receive a territory producing a yearly revenue 

 ot three lacs of rupees. Ragobah remained at Bom- 

 bay; the British maintained that the district ceded 

 to them did not yield the sum agreed upon. The 

 friends of Ragobah had defeated the adherents of the 

 young peishwah at Poonah, and the government of 

 Bombay, with the consent of the council of Bengal, 

 sent Ragobah, in 1778, with a British army, to 

 Poonah. The British gained many important advan- 

 tages; but, on account of their war with Hyder Ali, 

 peace was their chief object. It was concluded in 

 1782. They restored all the conquered countries 

 except Salsette and the neighbouring islands. Made- 

 row, the son of Narain Row, who had been assassin- 

 ated, was born in 1774, and, in 1783, declared peish- 

 wah, and was, for a time, under the guardianship of 

 one of the other Mahratta princes. Bajeerow, the 

 last peishwah, was established by a British force, 

 under the command of marquis Wellesley, now duke 

 of Wellington, and subdued several of the Mahratta 

 tribes, with the assistance of the British armies; but, 

 in 1817, he commenced hostilities against the British. 

 He was, however, so severely handled (November 

 1 6) by general Smith, that he abandoned his residence 

 at Poonah, and fled to a mountain fortress. In 1818, 

 he submitted to the British authority, and lived as a 

 private individual, with a yearly pension, under the 

 British inspection. 



2. The state of the Berar Mahrattas was not so 

 deeply involved in foreign wars, but suffered more 

 from domestic disturbances. Berar, the chief pro- 

 vince, is 200 miles long, and 170 broad. Rajoojee, 

 some years after his expeditions with the peishwah 

 against Bengal, wrested the best part of Orissa from 

 Aliverdy, the usurper of Bengal. A shallow stream 

 only separated the Berar Mahrattas from Bengal, and 

 they often made incursions into the frontier provinces 

 of that beautiful region. These devastations were not 

 checked until after Chossim Ali, nabob of Bengal, had 

 ceded (1701) Burdwan and Midnapour to the British. 

 Rajoojee, the first Berar rajah, after a long reign, left 

 four sons. The eldest succeeded his father, but died 

 without children. The two next, Sebagee and Moda- 

 gee, engaged in a war for the succession, in which 

 the former fell, and the latter became rajah. He also 

 assisted the Poonah Mahrattas in the war against the 

 British (in 1817), at first privately, but afterwards 

 openly, and was obliged to submit, and to cede to the 

 British his fortresses. Of the remaining Mahratta 

 princes, the most important were Sindia and Holkar. 

 The former was rajah of Oojein, and had become 

 very powerful. To limit his growing power war was 

 declared against him by the British, in 1802. and he 

 was defeated by the duke of Wellington (then mar- 

 quis Wellesley), September 23, 1803. He was obliged 

 to consent to a disadvantageous peace, which was 

 afterwards often violated. He died in 1827. Holkar, 

 sovereign of Indore, whose revenue was estimated at 

 ,4,600,000 sterling, was alternately the friend and 



memy of the British. In the war of 1805, he was 

 compelled to submit to disadvantageous terms. In 

 1817, he again took arms, but was defeated and 

 obliged to submit, and deprived of two-thirds of his 

 territories. He died in 1825. 



The Mahrattas profess the religion of Brama; they 

 are strong and firmly built, and vary in their com- 

 plexion from black to a light brown ; their manner 

 jf living is simple ; they have few wants ; they are 

 educated for war ; in battle, they intoxicate them- 

 selves with a sort of opium or wild hemp, which they 

 smoke, like tobacco. In the last war, their artillery 

 exhibited as much skill as courage. The subjuga- 

 tion of the Mahratta states was facilitated by the 

 circumstance that the military caste of the rajahs was 

 universally hated, because they treated the other 

 castes as slaves. The property and rights of the 

 latter found protection only under the British domi- 

 nion. The caste of warriors left the British provinces 

 in consequence, formed banditti (pindarees) on the 

 Nerbudda, and sought protection from the small 

 Mahratta princes, who were jealous of the British. 

 Thus arose the last general contest of the Europeans 

 with the ancient and proud caste of warriors, which 

 ended with the total dissolution of their order, and 

 the overthrow of the independence of their princely 

 families, in 1818. See Duff's History of the Mahrat- 

 tas (3 vols., 1826.) 



MAI A ; the eldest daughter of Atlas and Pleione, 

 the mother of Mercury by an amour with Jupiter, in 

 a grotto of the mountain Cyllene, in Arcadia, She 

 was placed, with her six sisters, among the stars, 

 where they have the common name of Pleiades. The 

 Romans also worshipped a Maia, who, however, was 

 the mother Earth (Cybele). The Tusculans called 

 their principal deity Maj'us, so that here the two 

 highest deities or principles of nature appear in a 

 male and female form. The month of May is said 

 to have received its name from them. See Magic. 



MAID OF ORLEANS. See Jeanne d'Arc. 



MAIDEN is the name of an instrument of capital 

 punishment, formerly used at Halifax, in Yorkshire, 

 and in Scotland, which is the prototype of the French 



fuillotine. The maiden is a broad piece of iron, a 

 )ot square, sharp on the lower part, and loaded above 

 with lead. At the time of execution, it was pulled 

 up to the top of a frame ten feet high, with a groove 

 on each side, for the maiden to slide in. The priso- 

 ner's neck being fastened to a bar underneath, on a 

 sign given the maiden was let loose, and the head 

 instantly severed from the body. 



MAIL, COAT OF ; also called habergeon. There 

 are two sorts chain and plate mail. Chain mail is 

 formed by a number of iron rings, each ring having 

 four others inserted into it, the whole exhibiting a 

 kind of net-work, with circular meshes, every ring 

 separately riveted. This kind of mail answers to that 

 worn on the ancient breastplates, whence they were 

 denominated loricee hammatee, from the rings being 

 hooked together. The habergeon, or hauberk, re- 

 sembled a shirt in make, and was thrown over the 

 upper part of the body above the clothing ; a collar 

 was applied round the neck ; and there was a hood, 

 or net helmet, to cover the head. Sometimes the 

 crown consisted of plates of iron, instead of rings ; 

 and iron plates, in like manner, were sometimes 

 clasped around the breast and back. In addition to 

 these parts, there were trowsers of similar construc- 

 tion, and it is probable, that the feet were defended 

 by a guard of the same description. 



Plate mail consisted of small lamina or plates, 

 usually of tempered iron, laid over each other like 

 the scales of a fish, and sewed to a strong linen or 

 leather jacket. The plates were in general very 

 numerous, small, and united so as to move freely 



