with "The Third English Reading
Book," and were painfully thumbing their way through a doggerel poem
about an "old man with hoary hair." One boy, bolder than the rest, slung
an English sentence at the visitor, and collapsed. It was his little
stock-in-trade, and the rest regarded him enviously. The Durbar supports
the school, which is entirely free and open; a just distinction being
maintained between the various castes. The old race prejudice against
payment for knowledge came out in reply to a question. "You must not
sell teaching," said the teacher; and the class murmured applausively,
"You must not sell teaching."
The population of Boondi seems more obviously mixed than that of the
other States. There are four or five thousand Mahometans within its
walls, and a sprinkling of aborigines of various varieties, besides the
human raffle that the Bunjaras bring in their train, with Pathans and
sleek Delhi men. The new heraldry of the State is curious--something
after this sort. _Or_, a demi-god, _sable_, issuant of flames, holding
in right hand a sword and in the left a bow--_all proper_. In chief, a
dagger of the _second_, sheathed _vert_, fessewise over seven arrows in
sheaf of the _second_. This latter blazon Boondi holds in commemoration
of the defeat of an Imperial Prince who rebelled against the Delhi
Throne in the days of Jehangir, when Boondi, for value received, took
service under the Mahometan. It might also be, but here there is no
certainty, the memorial of Rao Rutton's victory over Prince Khoorm, when
the latter strove to raise all Rajputana against Jehangir his father;
or of a second victory over a riotous lordling who harried Mewar a
little later. For this exploit, the annals say, Jehangir gave Rao Rutton
honorary flags and kettle-drums which may have been melted down by the
science of the Heralds College into the blazon aforesaid. All the
heraldry of Rajputana is curious, and, to such as hold that there is any
worth in the "Royal Science," interesting. Udaipur's shield is,
naturally _gules_, a sun in splendour, as befits the "children of the
Sun and Fire," and one of the most ancient houses in India. Her crest is
the straight Rajput sword, the _Khanda_, for an account of the worship
of which very powerful divinity read Tod. The supporters are a Bhil and
a Rajput, attired for the forlorn-hope; commemorating not only the
defences of Chitor, but also the connection of the great Bappa Rawul
with the Bhils, wh
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