They are none of them educated for civil offices under any other rule, nor could they, for a generation or two, be induced to submit to wear military uniform, or learn the drill of regular soldiers.  They are mere militia, brave as men can be, but unsusceptible of discipline.  They have, therefore, a natural horror at the thought of their states coming under any other than a domestic rule, for they could have no chance of employment in the civil or military establishments of a foreign power; and their lands would, they fear, be resumed, since the service for which they had been given would be no longer available to the rulers.  It is said that, in the long interval from the commencement of the reign of Alexander the third to the end of that of David the second,[33] not a single baron could be found in Scotland able to sign his own name.  The Bundelkhand barons have never, I believe, been quite so bad as this, though they have never yet learned enough to fit them for civil offices under us.  Many of them can write and read their own language, which is that common to the other countries around them.[34]

Bundelkhand was formerly possessed by another tribe of Rajputs, the proud Chandels, who have now disappeared altogether from this province.  If one of that tribe can still be found, it is in the humblest rank of the peasant or the soldier; but its former strength is indicated by the magnificent artificial lakes and ruined castles which are traced to them; and by the reverence which is still felt by the present dominant classes of [sic] their old capital of Mahoba.  Within a certain distance around that ruined city no one now dares to beat the ‘nakkara’, or great drum used in festivals or processions, lest the spirits of the old Chandel chiefs who there repose should be roused to vengeance;[35] and a kingdom could not tempt one of the Bundelas, Pawars, or Chandels to accept the government of the parish [’mauza’] in which it is situated.  They will take subordinate offices there under others with fear and trembling, but nothing could induce one of them to meet the governor.  When the deadly struggle between these two tribes took place cannot now be discovered.[36]

In the time of Akbar, the Chandels were powerful in Mahoba, as the celebrated Durgavati, the queen of Garha Mandla, whose reign extended over the Sagar and Nerbudda territories and the greater part of Berar, was a daughter of the reigning Chandel prince of Mahoba.  He condescended to give his daughter only on condition that the Gond prince who demanded her should, to save his character, come with an army of fifty thousand men to take her.  He did so, and ’nothing loth’, Durgavati departed to reign over a country where her name is now more revered than that of any other sovereign it has ever had.  She was killed above two hundred and fifty years ago, about twelve miles from Jubbulpore, while gallantly leading on her troops in their third and last attempt to stem the