On the 29th, we remained at Dholpur to receive and return the visits
of the young Raja, or, as he is called, the young Rana, a lad of
about fifteen years of age, very plain, and very dull. He came about
ten in the forenoon with a very respectable and well-dressed retinue,
and a tolerable show of elephants and horses. The uniforms of his
guards were made after those of our own soldiers, and did not please
me half so much as those of the Datiya guards, who were permitted to
consult their own tastes; and the music of the drums and fifes seemed
to me infinitely inferior to that of the mounted minstrels of my old
friend Parichhit.[9] The lad had with him about a dozen old public
servants entitled to chairs, some of whom had served his father above
thirty years; while the ancestors of others had served his
grandfathers and great-grandfathers, and I could not help telling the
lad in their presence that 'these were the greatest ornament of a
prince's throne and the best signs and pledges of a good government'.
They were all evidently much pleased at the compliment, and I thought
they deserved to be pleased, from the good character they bore among
the peasantry of the country.
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