Page:The Sikhs (Gordon).djvu/161

Rh Rajputni dame, who was waiting by her husband's body. She then said, placing his father's warrior plume on the son's turban: "My mind is now at perfect ease. Let the funeral pyre be prepared, and I will follow my lord in his journey to the next world. When I see your father I will tell him you acted as a brave and dutiful son."

The assembled Councils decided to place on the throne Duleep Singh, a boy of ten, who had been tardily acknowledged as the youngest son of Ranjit Singh, with Raja Heera Singh as Wuzir. Again the army demanded concessions and also the dismissal of the European officers, all of which were complied with, their power being irresistible. A brother Raja of the murdered Wuzir appeared on the scene as a claimant for the wuzirship. He was killed in his attempt to supplant his nephew. Then two young princes, adopted sons of Ranjit Singh,—Kishmira Singh and Peshora Singh, so called after the conquest