go HISTORY OF CASHMIR. 



lent and cruel propensities ; the kingdom upon his accession was crowded 

 with Mech'has, although whether as attached to the king, or as enemies, 

 does not appear. The violent disposition of this monarch led him to an 

 attack upon Lanca. The cloth of Sinhald was stamped with a golden foot as 

 the seal of its prince ; the wife of Mihiracula wearing- a jacket of Sinhald 

 cloth, the impression of the seal came off upon her bosom, and the kin- 

 happening to observe it, was filled with unappeasable indignation, at the 

 idea of the foot of a stranger being impressed upon the bosom of his wife. 

 To revenge the fancied insult, he led his army to Lanca, deposed the king-, 

 and placed anotheron the throne, stipulating- that the Sinhald cloths called 

 Yamushad&ca should in future bear his own seal, a golden sun. On his way- 

 back to Cashmir, he subdued the sovereigns of Chola, Camilla, Lata, and 

 other monarchs of the Decshin. Arrived in Cash?nir, he founded the temple 

 of Mihire swara in the capital, and built the city Mihirapur in the district 

 oi'Holora, in which the Gandhar* Brahmans, a low race, and therefore the 

 more highly esteemed by this iniquitous monarch, were permitted to seize 

 upon the endowments of the more respectable orders of the priesthood. Ac- 

 cording to Mahommed Azim, he also constructed in the purgunah of Ouder 

 the Chandracul canal, which existed in that writer's time. 



Two instances of this monarch's ferocious disposition are recorded by 

 the original authority, and have both been transcribed with some altera- 

 tion by Abulfazl and the other Mohammedan authors : on the return of Mi- 

 hiracula to his own kingdom, one of his elephants fell, whilst proceeding 

 along a narrow defile, and was crushed to pieces by the fall : the cries of the 

 dying animal were music to the ears of the prince, and so delighted was he 

 with the sound, that he ordered 100 elephants to be precipitated in a simi- 

 lar manner, that his entertainment might be protracted ; according to Abul- 

 fazl the pass was thence called Hasti Wuitav; Hasti signifying an elephant 

 and Wuttar meaning- injury ; the latter part of which etymology is scarcely 



Lis marriage with a VidhyMharl, a Hindu goddess of an inferior order. The prince is called 

 in the Vrihat Cathd,the son of Cdnac'ka : in other respects there is no question of the identity. 



* The MaMbhdfdt mentions the Brahmans of this country as of an inferior tribe, as is no- 

 ticed in Appendix, No. VI t 



