246

A STRIKING LANDMARK

Persian mirror-work, or with panels of white marble on which are sculptured the rose and the lotus, the doors of sandal wood and ivory, the vignettes of lovely mountain landscape seen through the lace-work of the window-lattices, and, above all, the sentiment of repose, and remoteness from the work-a-day world of coal and iron, seems a perfect parallel to the Alhambra, and completely embodies the Arabian idea of a kingly retreat.

VII

Our impressions of the marvels of Rajpootana would be incomplete without at least a brief reference to Gwalior and the fortress of Scindia. Shattered, ruinous, and rapidly falling into decay, it still remains a striking landmark, and a unique monument even in India - unique, for although there is something in the bizarre forms of its architecture akin to the early Persian palaces at Persepolis and elsewhere, as well as to the later edifices in Toorkistan, it bears the stamp of complete originality, as if its builders had been allowed to work out their own conception unhindered. I refer more specifically to the older portion, called the palace of Man Mandi.* Its long line of round sloping towers, capped with broad-rimmed cupolas, overtops the rocky ridge which rises straight from the plain, and the whole façade, within and without, is

*Fergusson says: “Of those buildings which so excited the admiration of the Emperor Baber, probably little now remains. The Moslems added to the palaces of the Hindoos, and spared their temples and the statues of the Jains. We have ruthlessly set to work to destroy whatever interferes with our convenience, and during the few years we have occupied the fort have probably done more to disfigure its beauties and obliterate its memories than was caused by the Moslems during the centuries they possessed or occupied it."

decorated with bands
and panels of brilliant
enamelled bricks, blue
and green and vivid yel-
low, varied with courses
of sculptured stone-work.
When the Emperor Baba
saw it in 1537, the domes
were covered with gilded
copper, and the whole
vast fabric must then
have been a blaze of col-
or. One amusing feature is a band or ribbon of rich blue
faience extending entirely round the façade, on which is
a line of yellow ducks; at one point only, where a mon-
key is chasing one of them, the movements of these
ducks depart a little from the conventionalized stiff-
ness of the others. Within the fortress walls are tem-
ples of earlier date, and there are two exquisite little
courts in the palace, so original in design that it would
puzzle an architect to classify them; and just outside the
western gate are colossal statues of gods wrought in the
face of the yellow cliff, like those at Abou-Simbel. This

PALACE OF THE MAHARAJAH OF GWALIOR,
SCINDIA

248

MODERN AND ANTIQUE TRAPS

fortress has long been the stronghold of the Mahratta rulers of the line of Scindia, and at the time of the Mutiny was occupied by the English, who have recently restored it to its original owners. Each race has left traces of its occupancy, and during the English régime many modern improvements were effected; ruinous palaces were fitted up as mess-rooms and officers' quarters, and as Cunningham says, "a lot of antiquarian rubbish was cleared away to make a parade-ground.”

The ancient city of Gwalior lies at the foot of the hill, but the new town, where the modern palace is situated, is some distance away-nearly an hour's drive, in fact, over circuitous roads. Near the palace are several walled and arcaded enclosures of great extent, where hundreds of horses are kept, belonging to the Maharajah, who is still a minor; and in a similar place are the royal carriages. Nothing could give a better idea of the scale on which such establishments are maintained than the number and variety of these equipages, many of them built by noted London or Paris firms. There are broughams or coupés, landaus, dog-carts, traps of all sorts, mail - phaetons and mail-coaches, victorias and double-seated "beach-wagons," and, to complete the catalogue, a regulation Paris omnibus, with "impériale."

A royal household, in order to keep up to the times, must include every article of luxury appertaining to European royalty, as well as the whole antique "kit" and picturesque lumber, palanquins, howdahs, and state chariots, which have come down to it from ancient days.

OUDEYPORE, THE CITY OF THE SUNRISE

I

THE little station at Chitor, asleep in the noonday glare, seemed more akin to a caravansary in the desert than to the noisy and bustling railway centres farther up the line. Only the station-master, whom it is correct to address as baboo, whether he may have any right to that title or not, and whose brown, spectacled visage was surmounted by a black velvet cap, the telegraph clerk, clad in a long white cotton garment, and the sepoy on guard at the freight-house, were present at our arrival. Across the railway track, which still rang with the reverberation of the departed train, arose, some distance away, a long wooded and bushy ridge, crowned with the level line of gray walls and towers of Chitor, the ancient capital of Mey war. The slender silhouettes of the two towers of Victory, which alone rose above the level sky-line, were so far off that one could only divine their exquisite sculpture by the irregularity of their outlines.

From the platform of the station only three other buildings were visible in all the vast and undulating halfdesert landscape which stretches away westward to the line of purple hills in the direction of Oudeypore, seventytwo miles away. I had expected to find a letter or telegram from that city, with some information as to means of conveyance, not having then learned that telegrams or other messages had to be sent by "dak post," or by special