Tempo:
CHAP. VI
RANJIT SINGH'S FAILINGS
159
The youth was married, in the year 1812, to the i802-2i_ daughter of a Kanhaya leader, and the nuptials were
heir.
celebrated amid many rejoicings. In 1816 the Maharaja placed the mother under some degree of restraint owing to her mismanagement of the estates assigned for the maintenance of the prince, and he endeavoured to rouse the spirit of his son to exertion and enterprise; but he was of a weak and indolent character, and the ^^^ ^^^^^ attempt was vain. In the year 1821 a son was born to smgn born Kharak Singh, and the child, Nau Nihal Singh, soon to Kharak singh. i82i. came to be regarded as the heir of the Punjab.^ Ranjit Singh, Ranjit relations of domestic the were Such but he shared largely in the opprobrium heaped upon Singh's perhis countrymen as the practisers of every immorality, ^^^^JJ^gg^"' and he is not only represented to have frequently ^°^ intemindulged in strong drink, but to have occasionally out- perance, in raged decency by appearing in public inebriated, and connexion surrounded with courtesans.- In his earlier days one with the of these women, named Mohra, obtained a great ascen- ^^^^^^^^ dancy over him, and, in 1811, he caused coins or medals retributed to be struck bearing her name; but it would be idle to to the mass regard Ranjit Singh as an habitual drunkard or as one of the sikh greatly devoted to sensual pleasures; and it would be people, equally unreasonable to believe the mass of the Sikh people as wholly lost to shame, and as revellers in every vice which disgraces hunjanity. Doubtless the sense of personal honour and of female purity is less high among the rude and ignorant of every age, than among the informed and the civilized; and when the whole peasantry of a country suddenly attain to power and wealth, and are freed from many of the restraints of society, an unusual proportion will necessarily resign themselves to the seductions of pleasure, and freely give way to their most depraved appetites. But such excesses are nevertheless exceptional to the general usage, and those who vilify the Sikhs at one time, and describe their long and rapid marches at another, should remember the contradiction, and reflect that what common-sense and the better feelings of our nature have always condemned, can never be the ordinary practice of a nation. The armed defenders of a country cannot be kept under the same degree of moral restraint as ordinary citizens, with quiet habits, fixed abodes, and watchful pastors, and it is illogical to apply the character of a few dissolute chiefs and licentious soldiers to the thousands of hardy peasants and industrious mechanics, and even generally to that 1 Cf. Murray, Ranjit Singh, pp. 48, 53, 90, 91, 112, 129. 2Cf. Murray, Ranjit Singh, p. 85.
RANJIT SINGH'S FAILINGS
159
The youth was married, in the year 1812, to the i802-2i_ daughter of a Kanhaya leader, and the nuptials were
heir.
celebrated amid many rejoicings. In 1816 the Maharaja placed the mother under some degree of restraint owing to her mismanagement of the estates assigned for the maintenance of the prince, and he endeavoured to rouse the spirit of his son to exertion and enterprise; but he was of a weak and indolent character, and the ^^^ ^^^^^ attempt was vain. In the year 1821 a son was born to smgn born Kharak Singh, and the child, Nau Nihal Singh, soon to Kharak singh. i82i. came to be regarded as the heir of the Punjab.^ Ranjit Singh, Ranjit relations of domestic the were Such but he shared largely in the opprobrium heaped upon Singh's perhis countrymen as the practisers of every immorality, ^^^^JJ^gg^"' and he is not only represented to have frequently ^°^ intemindulged in strong drink, but to have occasionally out- perance, in raged decency by appearing in public inebriated, and connexion surrounded with courtesans.- In his earlier days one with the of these women, named Mohra, obtained a great ascen- ^^^^^^^^ dancy over him, and, in 1811, he caused coins or medals retributed to be struck bearing her name; but it would be idle to to the mass regard Ranjit Singh as an habitual drunkard or as one of the sikh greatly devoted to sensual pleasures; and it would be people, equally unreasonable to believe the mass of the Sikh people as wholly lost to shame, and as revellers in every vice which disgraces hunjanity. Doubtless the sense of personal honour and of female purity is less high among the rude and ignorant of every age, than among the informed and the civilized; and when the whole peasantry of a country suddenly attain to power and wealth, and are freed from many of the restraints of society, an unusual proportion will necessarily resign themselves to the seductions of pleasure, and freely give way to their most depraved appetites. But such excesses are nevertheless exceptional to the general usage, and those who vilify the Sikhs at one time, and describe their long and rapid marches at another, should remember the contradiction, and reflect that what common-sense and the better feelings of our nature have always condemned, can never be the ordinary practice of a nation. The armed defenders of a country cannot be kept under the same degree of moral restraint as ordinary citizens, with quiet habits, fixed abodes, and watchful pastors, and it is illogical to apply the character of a few dissolute chiefs and licentious soldiers to the thousands of hardy peasants and industrious mechanics, and even generally to that 1 Cf. Murray, Ranjit Singh, pp. 48, 53, 90, 91, 112, 129. 2Cf. Murray, Ranjit Singh, p. 85.
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