Punjab.

Date:: 1908

Credit: Punjab. Source: Wellcome Collection.

424/486 (page 392)

$Climate, tempera- ture, and rainfall. History, 392 NATIVE STATES best timber trees are the deodar^ blue pine, chll {Finns lojtgi- folia), spruce, silver fir, and box. The forests abound in game, leopards, bears (especially black), hyenas, barking- deer, guralj and musk deer being common. Feathered game is also abundant, and fish in the larger streams. The autumn months are unhealthy, except in the upper ranges, the lower valley being malarious. The temperature is generally cool even in summer, except at Mandl, the capital, which is shut in by hills, and in the west of the State, which is only about 2,000 feet above sea-level. The rainfall in the upper ranges of the Nargu and Ghoghar-kl-Dhar hills is heavy. Mandl formed part of Suket State until in the reign of Sahu Sen, the eleventh of the Chandarbansi Rajas of that kingdom, Bahu Sen, his younger brother, left Suket and settled at Manglaur in Kulu. His descendant, Karanchan, was killed in a battle fought with the Raja of Kulu, and his Ram, who was pregnant, fled to her father’s house at Seokot. On the way a son was born to her under an oak {ban) tree, who succeeded the Rana of Seokot under the title of Ban Sen. Ban Sen enlarged his possessions and transferred his capital to Bhin, 4 miles above Mandi town, and his son Kalyan Sen purchased Batauhli opposite Mandl on the other side of the Beas ; but little is known of their successors until the time of Ajbar Sen, who founded the town of Mandl in 1527. The ambition of a later chief, Suraj Sen, brought disaster upon the principality. Having attacked Bangahal, he was defeated by Man Singh, the Raja’s brother-in-law, lost the salt-mines of Guma and Drang, and was compelled to sue for peace and pay a war indemnity; yet he built the strong fort of Kamla in 1625 and the Damdama palace at Mandl. All his eighteen sons having died in his lifetime, he had an image made of silver which he called MMhava Rao, and to it he bequeathed his kingdom in 1648. He was succeeded in 1658 by his brother Shyam Sangh, who built the temple of Shyami Kali on the Tarna ridge in Mandl town. His successor Gur Sen brought the famous image preserved in the Padal temple from Jagannath, and his illegitimate son Jippu reorganized the revenue of the State on a system still in force. Raja Sidh Sen, who succeeded in 1686, a great warrior supposed to be possessed of miraculous powers, conquered Nachan, Hath, and Baled in 1688, and Dhanesgarh, Raipur, and Madhopur from Suket in 1690; but he treacherously murdered Birth! PM, the Raja of Bangahal, at Mandl. He adorned his capital$

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