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Imperial Gazetteer of India, v. 17, p. 52.

52 MAKR<91VA centuries, and from which the material used in the construction of the Taj Mahal at Agra was obtained. It has been proposed to use this marble for the Victoria Memorial Hall at Calcutta. The quarries vary in depth from 30 to 75 feet, and the yearly out-turn averages about goo or 1,ooo tons. The marble is excavated by blasting, and is then cut into required sizes by means of steel saws. The chips and dust left behind after the blocks have been hauled to the surface are burnt into lime, and used for the finer kinds of plastering. There are now twenty-six quarries being worked, which give employment to about loo labourers daily, mostly of the Silawat caste of Muhammadans. Maksudābād.-Old name of MURSHIDABAD TOWN, Murshidabad District, Bengal. Maksudangarh (Naidkila).-Petty State in Central India, under the Bhopal Agency, with an area of about 8r square miles. It lies in Malwa and takes its name from the chief town. The State originally formed a part of Raghugarh. In 1776 Raja Balwant Singh of Raghu- garh granted the tract to his brother Budh Singh, whose son Durjan Sal (1795-1811) considerably extended his possessions, founding a State of which the town of Bahadurgarh (now Isagarh in Gwalior) was the capital. Early in the nineteenth century his lands were seized by Sindhia, but were in part restored by Sindhia's general, Jean Baptiste Filose, who in 1816 installed Beri Sal Khichi, of the Lalawat branch of the family, as chief of Maksudangarh. Since then it has existed as a separate State, feudatory to Gwalior, to which,, however, it pays no tribute. Its position is thus peculiar, as the chief does not hold under a British guarantee. Since the establishment of the Bhopal Agency, however, the internal administration has invariably been con- ducted under the supervision of the Political Agent, without inter- ference on the part of the Gwalior Darbar. The present chief, Raghunath Singh, succeeded in 1864 at the age of fifteen. The State, which had been mismanaged, was taken under superintendence by the Political Agent in 1880, with the concurrence of the Mahārajā Sindhia, and is still under supervision. The chief bears the hereditary title of Raja. The population was : (1891) 14,422, and (1go1) 14,284, giving a density of 176 persons per square mile. Hindus number 12,214, or 85 per cent.; Animists, 1,661, or 12 per cent.; and Musalmans, 398. The State contains 8o villages. About 16 square miles are cultivated. The soil is fertile and bears good crops, but the absence of roads prevents any great development of trade. Opium, the most important product, has to be taken more than 50 miles by country track to the railway. The total revenue is about Rs. 37,000, of which RS. 28,ooo is derived from land. The chief town is Maksudangarh, situated in 24° 4' N. and 77°