लोकांशीं व भरतपूरची गादी अन्यायानें बळकावणाऱ्या राजाशीं आमचीं अनेक युद्धें झाली. ह्या युद्धांमुळे मार्क्विस ऑफ हेस्टिंग्ज ह्या गव्हरनर
ferent to the eclât of lending the great Company Bahadoor a paltry million ?' The shrewd idea was acted on. Colonel Stewart, a very able diplomatist, was the Resident at the Court of Gwalior, and to him was confidentially entrusted the delicate task of pumping—we beg parden for the vulgarism-her Royal Highness. Now, we do not doubt that some extremely watchful game-keeper has caught a weasel very fast asleep, although the fact is not recorded in any known work on Natural History; but we very much question if any Resident at her court ever found the Baiza Bye napping. She was a true Asiatic woman, 'and something more;'— crafty, false, intriguing, vigilant; 'the something more' being that she had not, it was said, a single amiable weakness. By some means or other, this artful personage got scent of the intention to borrow, and naturally enough became awakened to a sense of the danger. She hastily dispatched a favourite, one Dada Khasgeewalla -of whom we shall hear more by and by-to the Colonel, to ask him if he thought, her troops being mutinous on account of not getting their pay, the British Government could be pursuaded to lend her a million ? Here was a singular coincidence certainly, and one that took the wind completely out of the sails of the gallant Resident. We may suppose, without drawing largely on the imagination, that Colonel Stewart wrote to his lordship, Lord Ahmerst, expressing his deep concern and surprise- we know that Dada did surprise him-to find that her Highness herself was in great want of money. 'Indeed, her minister has just been here to ask me if the British Government could lend her a million !'"
—House of Scindea. Page 19-20.
