In the Hindu word which designates a feud we have another of those striking coincidences in terms to which allusion has already been made: _vair_ is ‘a feud,’ _vairi_, ‘a foe.’ The Saxon term for the composition of a feud, _wergild_, is familiar to every man. In some of these States the initial vowel is hard, and [182] pronounced _bair_. In Rajasthan, _bair_ is more common than _vair_, but throughout the south-west _vair_ only is used. In these we have the original Saxon word _war_,[3.4.22] the French _guer_. The Rajput _wergild_ is land or a daughter to wife. In points of honour the Rajput is centuries in advance of our Saxon forefathers, who had a legislative remedy for every bodily injury, when each finger and toe had its price.[3.4.23] This might do very well when the injury was committed on a hind, but the Rajput must have blood for blood. The monarch must be powerful who can compel acceptance of the compensation, or _mund-kati_.[3.4.24] The prosecution of a feud is only to be stopped by a process which is next to impracticable; namely, by the party injured volunteering forgiveness, or the aggressor throwing himself as a suppliant unawares on the clemency of his foe within his own domains: a most trying situation for each to be placed in, yet not unexampled, and revenge in such a case would entail infamy. It was reserved for these degenerate days to produce such an instance. =Amargarh-Shāhpura Feud.=—The Raja of Shahpura, one of the most powerful of the chiefs of Mewar, and of the Rana’s blood, had a feud with the Ranawat chief, the Bhumia proprietor of Amargarh. Ummeda,[3.4.25] the chief of Shahpura, held two estates: one was the grant of the kings of Delhi, the other of his own sovereign, and each amounting to £10,000[3.4.26] of annual rent, besides the duties on commerce. His estate in Mewar was in the district of Mandalgarh, where also lay his antagonist’s; their bounds were in common and some of the lands were intermixed: this led to disputes, threats, and blows, even in the towns of their fathers, between their husbandmen. The Bhumia Dilel was much less powerful; he was lord of only ten villages, not yielding above £1200 a year; but they were compact and well managed, and he was [183] popular amongst his brethren, whose swords he could always command. His castle was perched on a rock, and on the towers facing the west (the direction of Shahpura) were mounted some swivels: moreover a belt of forest surrounded it, through which only two or three roads were cut, so that surprise was impossible. Dilel had therefore little to fear, though his antagonist could bring two thousand of his own followers against him. The feud burned and cooled alternately; but the Raja’s exposed villages enabled Dilel to revenge himself with much inferior means. He carried off the cattle, and sometimes the opulent subjects, of his foe, to his donjon-keep in Amargarh for ransom. Meanwhile the husbandmen of