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244 . the - story;; of - an indian princ...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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* The Press Has Teemed Of Late Years Wit...
satisfaction of knowing that she was inspired by a loftier feeling * , that it was indeed the highest of all motives which prompted her
unvarying excellence . She used to say that she " deemed herself answerable to God for every exercise of power / ' and it was her
religion , true as a feeling , however false as a creed , which strengthened her to perform all her worldly duties with unwearied
diligence and fidelity . Every interval of business not absolutely required for rest was given to devotion , and affairs of State only
alternated with works of charity . The Brahmins were generally the agents of her unbounded munificence , and by their means she
held correspondence with the most remote parts of India , till not only throughout her own territory were temples built , wells dug ,
and Dhurrum Sallas ( or places of rest for travellers ) established , ¦ but west in _from all orient chief Juggernaut places of hol to y far pil -stretching grimage , north Cape , Oomorin south , east on , the or
one , hand , and the snowy ranges of the Himalayas on the other , her bounty flowed like a fertilizing stream throughout the vast
Indian continent , its course marked everywhere by sacred buildings and provision for the poor or weary , supported at her expense ,
while large annual sums were also sent to be distributed in general charity . Captain T . D . Steuart , when travelling in
Kedarnath in 1818 , met with frequent traces of her venerated memory in that remote part of India , and on one occasion in
particular , found an excellent Dhurrum Salla and reservoir of water built at her costmany thousand feet high among the mountains ,
far from all human , habitation , and where such accommodation must have been as welcome to the pilgrim or traveller , as wholly
unexpected . Thoughtful as generous , scarcely any act of her beneficence was more appreciated than her sending constant
supplies of Ganges' water to wash the sacred images in the temples of the South ; and more satisfactory to the Christian—because an
act untainted by superstition , and a literal rendering too of what the Christian's Master has promised to regard with favour—during *
the hot season she had persons stationed on the roads to supply every thirsty passer-by with that most precious boon in a dry
and sultry land—" a cup of cold water . " Nay , even the lower creation shared her tender care , and the peasants near Mhysir
often had their oxen stopped on hot days by her servant having "been sent forth to bring a welcome draught to the suffering
animals ; while little birds , justly driven , as she remarked , by cultivators from destroying the grain on which they depended for
their own subsistence , were free to regale in flocks on fields she had purchased to devote solely to their use . On festival days she
gave entertainments to the lowest classes , and daily fed crowds of infirm poorto whom in the cold weather she also distributed
clothing . ! Nbr , was this munificence exercised in any degree at
the expense of her subjects , for the family treasures ( said to have
244 . The - Story;; Of - An Indian Princ...
244 . the - story ;; of - an _indian princess .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), June 1, 1863, page 244, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01061863/page/28/
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