nel
Mark Wilks, observed that "the territories composing the present dominion
of His Highness the Rajah of Mysore had, from the remotest periods of
tradition, been held by a number of polygars and petty Rajahs, whose
possessions were incessantly enlarged, diminished, or alienated, by a
series of revolutions which it would perhaps be impossible to trace, and
unprofitable to describe," and it is interesting to note how little, at
that time, seems to have been known about the history of the kingdoms we
conquered. But all doubts as to the early history of Mysore have now been
removed, and the reader will find in Mr. Rice's admirable gazetteer of
Mysore a minute history of the country accompanied by coloured maps which
show at a glance the numerous transitions which the territories now
comprised under the head of Mysore have undergone in former times, but as
I think that it would certainly be unprofitable to describe these
transitions here I shall content myself with a bare enumeration of those
leading facts which are necessary for a general comprehension of the
situation. All, then, that the reader requires to know is, that a line of
Hindoo Rajahs which once reigned over a very limited portion of Mysore
gradually acquired about half of it; that a descendant of their line was
set aside by the Mahometan usurper Hyder Ali (an able soldier of fortune,
who had risen to the chief command of the army); that he conquered the
remainder of the present territory and ruled it from 1761 to 1782; and
that after his death he was succeeded by his son Sultan Tippoo, who on May
4th, 1799, lost his life at Seringapatam, and with it all the territories
acquired by his father, thereby fulfilling what Hyder Ali said when he
observed to his son one day, "I was born to win and you were born to lose
an empire." The subsequent history of the province is soon told. After the
fall of Seringapatam it was resolved to place a descendant of the old
Hindoo line on the throne, and Krishna Rajah Wodeyar--then about five
years old, became Maharajah of Mysore, with Purnaiya (formerly prime
minister of Tippoo) as Dewan and Regent, and Colonel (afterwards Sir
Barry) Close as Resident, while Colonel Arthur Wellesley (afterwards Duke
of Wellington) commanded the division. Under the new Government all at
first went well, and in 1804 the Governor-General declared that during the
past five years "the affairs of the Government of Mysore had been
conducted with a degree