Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/287

Rh what he did as a politician than by what he wrote as a man of letters, and by what Le was as a man ; and in these respects he takes rank amongst the most illustrious repre- sentatives of his nation and his age.  GUJARAT. See.  GUJRÁNWÁLA, a British district in the Punjab, lying between 31° 32’ and 32° 33’ N. lat., and between 73° 11’ 30” and 74° 23’ 15” E. long., with an area (1877) of 2563 square miles, and population (1868) of 550,576. It is bounded on the N.W. by the river Chenab, on the 5. and 8.E. by the districts of Jhang and Lahore, and on the E. by the district of Sialkot. This district forms the central portion of the Rechna Dodh, intermediate between the fertile submontane plains of Sialkot and the desert expanses of Jhang. On the northern frontier, a belt of alluvial land, some 2 to 6 miles in breadth, fringes the Chendb through- out its course. The southern portion of the plateau has a rich soil, with accessible water ; the villages here lie close together, while the people are careful and industrious cultivators. But further south the ground becomes harder and drier until in the extreme south the ldr, a flat expanse of barren land, passes slowly into the desert of Jhang. In the south-east corner of the district, the little river Degh irrigates and fertilizes a tiny valley of its own. Two or three minor watercourses are used for the purposes of irrigation in the villages through which they pass. The country 1s very bare of trees, and the scenery throughout is tame and in the central plateau becomes very monotonous. The district of Gujranwala is essentially a modern one; yet it can claim considerable relics of the past, constructed during an early period of prosperity. It seems lkely that the district once contained the capital of the Punjab, at an epoch when Lahore had not begun to exist. We learu from the Chinese Buddhist pilgrim,, that about he visited a town known as Tse-kia (or Taki), the metropolis of the whole country of the five rivers. A mound near the modern village of Asazur has been identified as the site of the ancient capital. Until the Mahometan invasions little is known of Gujranwdla except that Taki had fallen into oblivion and Lahore had become the chief city. Under Malometan rule the district flour- ished for a time; but a mysterious depopulation fell upon the tract, and the whole region seems to have been almost entirely abandoned. At the first beginning of the Sikh war, the waste plains of Gujranwala were seized by vari- ous military adventurers. Charat Sinh tvok possession of the village of Gujranwala, and here his grandson the great maharaja Ranjit Sinh was born. The Sikh rule, which was elsewhere so disastrous, appears to have been an unmitigated benefit to this district. Ranjit Sinh settled large colonies in the various villages, and encouraged culti- vation throughout the depopulated plain. In 1847 the district came under British influence, in connexion with the regency at Lahore; and in 1849 it was included in the territory annexed after the second Sikh war. Since that time Gujranwala las enjoyed an immunity from the cata- strophes of history, with the exception of the events of 1857, which belong to the general annals of India.

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, the chief town and administrative head- quarters of the above district, in 32° 9’ 30” N. lat. and 74° 14’ E. long., with a population in 1868 of 19,381, The town is situated on the Grand Trunk road and Northern State Railway, 40 miles north of Lahore. It is of modern creation, and owes its importance to the father and grand- father of Maharaja Ranjit Sinh, whose capital it formed during the early period of the Sikh power. There is a mausoleum to Mahan Sinh, father of Ranjit Sinh, and a lofty cupola covers a portion of the ashes of the mabarajé himself. The civil station lies a mile south-east of the native town. It contains the court-house, treasury, jail, dispensary, post-office, staging bungalow, and church.  GUJRÁT, or, a British district in the Punjab, lying between 32° 10’ 30” and 33° N. lat., and between 73° 20’ and 74° 31’ E. long. ; area (1877), 2029 square miles ; population (1868), 616,317 souls. It is bounded on the N.E. by the native state of Kashmir, on the N.W. by the river Jhilam, on the W. by Shahpur district, and on the S.E. by the rivers Tavi and Chendb. The district of Gujrat comprises a narrow wedge of sub-Himdalayan plain country, possessing few natural advantages. From the basin of the Chendb on the south the general level rises rapidly towards the interior, which, owing to the great distance of the water beneath the surface, assumes a dreary and desert aspect. <A range of low hills, known as the Pabbi, traverses the northern angle of Gujrat. They are composed of a friable Tertiary sandstone and conglomerate, totally destitute of vegetation, and presenting to the view a mere barren chaos of naked rock, deeply scored with pre- cipitous ravines. Immediately below the Pabbi stretches a high plateau, terminating abruptly in a precipitous bluff some 200 feet in height. At the foot of this plateau is a plain, which forms the actual valley of the Chendb and participates in the irrigation from the river bed. The district as a whole is well wooded, and great attention has been paid to arboriculture. Numerous relics of antiquity stud the surface of Gujrat district. Mounds of ancient construction yield numbers of early coins, and bricks are found whose size and type prove them to belong to the prehistoric period of Hindu architec- ture. A mound now occupied by the village of Moga or Mong has been identified as the site of Nicia, the city built by Alexander the Great on the field of his victory over Porus. The Delhi empire established its authority in this district under Balilol Lodi (–). it was visited by Akbar, who founded Gujrat as the seat of government. During the decay of the Mughal power, the Ghakkars of Rawal Pindi overran this portion of the Punjab and established themselves in Gujrat about 1741. Meanwhile the Sikh power had been asserting itself in the eastern Punjab, and in 1765 the Ghakkar chief was defeated by Sardar Gujar Sinh, chief of the Bhangi con- federacy. On his death, his son succeeded him, but after afew months’ warfare, in 1798, he submitted himself as vassal to the maharaja Ranjit Smh. In 1846 Gujrat first came under the supervision of British officials. Two years