AUGUST, 1873.]

STORY OF RANí PINGLA.

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STORY OF RáNí PINGLA. BY MAJOR JOHN W. WATSON, ACTING POLITICAL SUPERINTENDENT, PAHLANPUR.

last sovereign of Chandrāvati of the Par mår dynasty was named Hün. One day Rāja Hún went to the forest to hunt, and there was a native Pärdhi also lying in wait for game. Shortly after a black cobra bit the Pärdhi, who

died immediately from the effects of the bite. The Rāja however sat still watching what might happen. After a little while, the wife of the Pärdhi came in search of her husband,

and found him thus lying dead. She wept and bewailed him much, then collecting wood made a pile to burn the body: when the corpse was being burned she cut off pieces of her own flesh and threw them on the pile; finally she climbed on the pile and embracing her husband's corpse became a sati. The King witnessed all this, and was struck with the devotion of the woman, and on his return home related the cir cumstance to his Queen, whose name was Râni Pinglå, the daughter of Rāja Somachandra, and said to her that he had never seen or heard

of a sati like the Pärdhi's wife. Râni Pinglă replied that the woman hardly deserved to be called a sati, that she was simply a surmi, or a brave or desperate character, who had destroy ed herself on the spur of the moment, and that a real sati was one who, on hearing even of her husband's death, would bathe, put his tur

ban on her bosom, and heave a sigh which

put the question to it; should your

hus

band be alive, water will ooze out of its leaves; but if he be dead the leaves will wither and fall

off.” Râni Pinglá received the seed with grati tude, and sowed it in her yard. A few months after this, Rāja Hún left Chan drāvati to subdue a refractory Mehvāsi village, and determined to send from thence a false intimation of his death to the Râni to test her virtue as a sati. He desired his Sirdars to be

the medium of this communication, but they all indignantly refused, saying that it would be a

black deed. At last a Rabāri agreed to carry the tidings, and the King gave him his own turban to deliver to the Queen, desiring him to tell her at the last that the news was false.

The Rabāri

then mounted his camel and taking the king's turban went to Chandrāvati.

At this time Râni

Pinglå and her maidens were in a balcony of the palace; the Queen saw the Rabāri afar off and intuitively felt that her death was near.

She said to her maidens, “The day of my death has come.”

Her maidens endeavoured to com

fort her, but, she pointed to the camel now ap proaching nearer and nearer, and said, “There is the messenger of the fatal tidings.” Just then the Rabāri arrived, and began to call out, “Alas! Alas! Rāja Hàn is slain " He then handed over the King's turban to one

of the attendants for delivery to Rånt Pinglä,

would end in instant death, the soul escaping through an aperture caused by the bursting of the skull. The Rāja rejoined that if there were

to whom it was at once conveyed. Râni

any true sati in the world, it must be Râni

approached the Asso Pål plant and asked

Pinglä herself. From this the Queen consider ed within herself that the King might one day

it whether her husband were alive or dead:

test her virtue as a sat?.

fying her that Rāja Hàn was alive. She however thought thus within herself: If I do

Some time after this

occurrence, her spiritual preceptor, Guru Datá triya, paid her a visit. Râni Pinglă implored him, saying, “Reverend Sir, give me such a thing that by virtue of it I may be enabled to know of the death of my husband, even though it should happen far away from Chan

drāvati.” The Guru gave her a seed of the Asso Pål tree, and said,

“Sow that in your

chaok (yard), and in a short time it will grow into a plant.

Pinglä wept bitterly, she then bathed and water oozed out of the leaves, thereby satis

not die, I shall lose the love of my husband, whereas if I become a sati, I shall not only reign with him in Swarga, but shall be re-united to him in my next birth on the earth; further, were

I not to die, I should shame my father, Rāja Somachandra. She then addressed the Asso Pál tree thus—

• THT affa Hi,

Whenever you wish to ascertain

whether your husband be dead or alive, you should bathe, and then, approaching the plant,

• RFA siń Hà Hs,

iſ ºf USIT 5ſq Has.