1872.] Notes on Bdjd Todar Mall. 141 



" The electrotypes have been taken from two ancient seals in conielian 

 in the possession of Col. G-. Pearse. The characters on them are of the 

 Shah type, and as old as the Christian era. I read them salyd ^^T, a 

 feminine name, the wife of Salya, or ' a water-nymph,' from sala, water. 

 In the Mahabharata a name very like it occurs as that of the maternal uncle 

 of Yudliishthii'a, but it begins with the palatal s', and the name of the 

 owner of the seals was, of course, a different and much later personage. 



" The first syllable sa is undoubted ; so are the I and the final lono* 

 vowel a ; but the y is a puzzle. At first, I took it for a ^, rT ; but I am now 

 disposed to read it as a y. The figure at the end of the line is a star or 

 full stop, and not a letter." 



The Philological Secretary read the following letter from Babii Kashi- 

 nath, Head Master, Anglo- Vernacular School, Sirsa, Allahabad, regarding 

 Eaja Todar Mall. 



" I read with much interest and pleasure the letters from Mr. M. L. 

 Ferrar and Maulavi Muhammad Husain of the Labor College and your own 

 remarks regarding Paja Todar Mall, which appeared in the Proceedings 

 of your Society for February 1872. Being a Tundun K'hatri, the same caste 

 to which the Raja belonged, and a resident of Agrah, I beg to offer a 

 few remarks on that distinguished minister of Akbar, which I hope you 

 will lay before the next meeting of the Societ}^. 



" Maulavi Muhammad Husain says that Raja Todar Mall could not 

 have been a Kaith, because the syllable Mcdl is never used by that caste. 

 But the syllables 3Iall, Das, Frdsada, Mam, are not peculiar to any 

 particular caste or clan in Upper India ; they are equally applicable to all 

 Hindus. The Raja being a K'hatri is quite certain from historical and 

 traditional evidence, and to call him a Kaith, seems to be an unconscious 

 mistake on the part of the editor of Elphinstone's History of India. 



" In para. 2 of his letter, the Maulavi says, " There is a Mahallah 

 in Agrah, where the funeral ceremonies (i^-^j't^') are performed by all 

 K'hatris, and every one there knows that it was the Mahallah where Todar 

 Mall used to live. In fact he had chosen his residence there, in order to be 

 present at the funeral ceremonies of members of his caste." Agrah is my 

 birth-place, but I am not aware of the existence of such a Mahallah. There 

 are three Mah alias only (Mai than ^T^"?n*r, Pannigali tt^JI^, and 

 Chatta 1^ Tfi) and w^hich are solely inhabited by K'hatris, and which are as old 

 as Akbar's time, containing two temples of v/liite and black marble, con- 

 secrated to Mahadeva built by a K'hatri named Raison Das, who is said 

 to have been a mutagaddi at Akbar's court. There is an open space just in 

 front of Mahallah Gliatta, now occupied by a tdl, where a funeral ceremony 

 peculiar to us is up to the present time performed by K'hatris. When 



