222 
SCENES IN INDIA. 
a tolerably long life of sovereign dominion, the pos- 
session of so great an extent of territory with so little 
disturbance, if we consider that his whole political life 
was one of aggression and feudal warfare. Even while 
he was intrusted with the important command of the 
Paishwa’s body-guard, which consisted of the choicest 
of his cavalry, he had a considerable army in his 
own pay; and upon the death of Mulhar Rao, the 
founder of the Holcar family, so distinguished in 
Mahratta warfare, he became the most powerful among 
the Mahratta chieftains. 
Notwithstanding the general success of his arms, 
Scindia received some occasional checks, as at the 
battle of Lalsont, in which he was so completely de- 
feated by the combined forces of Marwar and Jeipoor, 
that a large portion of the territory which he had pre- 
viously secured was for the moment snatched from 
his grasp, and it was some time before he recovered 
from the effects of that signal discomfiture. It is, how- 
ever, surprising to observe how quickly the Mahratta 
power appeared to derive new energy from defeat. 
Though at the battle of Paniput, in which Mahadajee 
first gave those tokens of military capacity which 
distinguished him through life, and where upwards of 
a hundred thousand men are said to have been left 
dead on the field of battle, the Mahratta supremacy 
seemed for ever annihilated ; yet we shortly after see 
their armies pouring like a deluge over the fertile 
plains of Hindostan, establishing new principalities, 
and again rearing the shrine of idolatry where the 
crescent had once proudly waved in scorn of the 
impure rites of Hindoo devotion, or where the stately 
