60 GATES OF SOMNATH. 



European army It was the sense of power that 



induced them to rebel." 



The Sepoy, it is w^ell known, only rebels for his pay 

 or his caste ; the former he receives punctually, but 

 the report, carefully disseminated by emissaries of the 

 king of Oude, that the cartridges had been greased 

 with the fat of cows and pigs, thus striking at the 

 religious prejudices of Hindu and Mohamedan by one 

 blow, frightened and exasperated him, in the same 

 manner as at Vellore, in 1806, the Government order 

 to change the turban of the Sepoys, which the family 

 of Tippoo took advantage of, and thereby caused the 

 fii'st mutiny. 



Within the Fort, besides the Motee Musjid already 

 described, there is the modern Arsenal, in which are sup- 

 posed to be preserved the celebrated gates of Somnath, 

 the holy Brahminical city of Goojrat ; they are about 

 twelve feet high, and said to be composed of sandal 

 wood, elaborately carved and inlaid. Another account, 

 however, and probably the true one, is that the 

 genuine gates, which for eight centuries had been 

 guarding the tomb of Mahmud of Ghazni, had been 

 restored to the temple of Somnath, whilst those 

 carried off by Gen. Nott in 1842, and brought to Agra, 

 were not of sandal wood at all, but of deal, and of 

 much latei- date. As I did not see them, I cannot 



