1 22 HISTORY OF RUNJEET SING'S FAMILY.
2 that liis death would be the signal for his own destruction by
3 the Kunnia Missall, which was then very powerful. On hearing
4 of the murder of his supposed mistress, however, Hakeekuth
5 Sing', though attended by some three hundred followers, imme-
6 diately fled to his jaghire near Wazeerabad. After all, it was
7 by those best informed on the subject, asserted that the princi-
8 pal paramour of the Mai Wuzeerabadia, as the mother of Maha
9 Sing was called, was Joy Ram Misser, the Gooroo or religious
10 preceptor of the family. This man, on hearing of the mur-
11 der, fled to Peshawar to avoid a similar fate.
12 In 1780 or 1781, Maha Sing exchanged turbans, in
13 token of brotherhood, with Bejerei Dehu, now become
14 Rajah of Jummoo, and shortly after found means to attack
15 and plunder Jummoo and its district. In 1782, joined by
16 Jessa Sing Ramgharria and Rajah Sansar Chund of Teera,
17 he fought and slew Goorbux Sing' the son of Jey Sing
18 and chief of the Bhaungee Missall. In 1787 he besieged
19 Gujerat, then ruled by Sobh Sing son of Gujer Sing, who
20 was married to Purthaubee or Purthaub Kour, his, Maha
21 Sing's, own sister. During this siege however he became
22 dang-erously ill from the effects of drinking and other irre-
23 gularities of living, and early in 1780 was brought home
24 to his fort of Gujerawalla where in a few months afterwards
25 he died. It is commonly reported that remorse for the mur-
26 der of his mother drove Maha Sing to drinking as a means
27 of drowning all disagreeable thoughts, and that he was often
28 heard to declare that liquor alone could make him forget his
29 guilt. He had also another cause of disquiet in his jealousy
30 of his wife whose fidelity he suspected even from the day of
31 their marriage. He ■ was, it is said, more than once heard
32 to express strong doubts as to the paternity of Runjeet his
33 reputed son; and he regarded one Luckpath Rao, formerly
34 his father's dewan and minister, and still a young man of
35 good person and engaging address, as his favoured rival in
36 the affections of the Mai Malwine.