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band of subordinate sovereigns. The very title of MAHARAJAH, or 

 Rajah of Rajahs, which the nominal head of that vast empire 

 anciently bore, evidently implies no more than a kind of feudal 

 jurisdiction over chieftains, possessing absolute dominion in their 

 own territories, but contributing a stipulated sum and force to sup- 

 port the grandeur of the imperial throne, and on great national oc- 

 casions, ranging themselves, with succours proportionate to the ex- 

 tent and population of their respective domains, under the banners 

 of one supreme chief. Nature herself, in fact, seems to have placed, 

 in this respect, a barrier to human pride ; forbidding Hindostan, 

 except in the limited way just intimated, to continue long under the 

 control of one overgrown monarch. To bound the ambition of prin- 

 ces, over the surface of the country she drew those vast lines which 

 so peculiarly distinguish that quarter of the globe; those lofty moun- 

 tains, those deep and rapid rivers, those extensive lakes, those vast 

 deserts of sand and impassable forests, which intersect India. 

 Again, whatever may be boasted by the Indian historians concern- 

 ing themselves, and the chain of succession remaining for such an 

 extended period of years unbroken, in its two first and greatest dy- 

 nasties of the sun and moon, their accounts are rendered exceedingly 

 suspicious, not only by what we know of the perpetual proneness 

 in mankind to abuse extensive power, but by the corruptions ne- 

 cessarily attending the education of Eastern princes, by the number 

 of royal children yearly produced in the seraglios, and by the spirit 

 of intrigue that in a particular manner constantly agitates the 

 Asiatic courts, amidst so many rivals as the first order of nobility 

 affords for wealth, power, and renown. 



Divided by the Oriental geographers into two grand portions, 

 AL SIND, or the tract lying on the Indus, and AL HIND, or the 

 territory stretching on both sides the Ganges, Hindostan, or Su- 

 perior India, seems, from time immemorial, amidst innumerable 



