CHAPTER XI

CHRONICLE OF THE REIGN

The position in India, in the sixth year of Akbar's reign, dating

from the battle of Panipat, but the first of his personal rule, may

thus be summarised. He held the Punjab and the North-western

Provinces, as we know those provinces, including Gwalior and Ajmere

to the west, Lucknow, and the remainder of Oudh, including Allahabad,

as far as Jaunpur, to the east. Benares, Chanar, and the provinces of

Bengal and Behar, were still held by princes of the house of Sur, or

by the representatives of other Afghan families. The whole of

Southern India, the greater part of Western India, were outside the

territories which acknowledged his sway.

There can be little doubt that, during the five years of his tutelage

under Bairam, Akbar had deeply considered the question of how to

govern India so as to unite the hearts of the princes and people

under the protecting arm of a sovereign whom they should regard as

national. The question was encumbered with difficulties. Four

centuries of the rule of Muhammadan sovereigns who had made no

attempt to cement into one bond of mutual interests the {92} various

races who inhabited the peninsula, each ruling on the principle of

temporary superiority, each falling as soon as a greater power

presented itself, had not only introduced a conviction of the

ephemeral character of the successive dynasties, and of the actual

dynasty for the time being. It had also left scattered all over the

country, from Bengal to Gujarat, a number of pretenders, offshoots of

families which had reigned, every one of whom regarded the Mughal as

being only a temporary occupant of the supreme seat of power, to be

replaced, as fortune might direct, possibly by one of themselves,

possibly by a new invader. This conviction of the ephemeral character

of the actual rule was increased by the recollection of the ease with

which Humayun had been overthrown. Defeated at Kanauj, he had quitted

India leaving not a trace of the thirteen years of Mughal sway, not a

single root in the soil.

These were facts which Akbar had recognised. The problem, to his

mind, was how to act so as to efface from the minds of princes and

people these recollections; to conquer that he might unite; to

introduce, as he conquered, principles so acceptable to all classes,

to the prince as well as to the peasant, that they should combine to

regard him as the protecting father, the unit necessary to ward off

from them evil, the assurer to them of the exercise of their

immemorial rights and privileges, the assertor of the right of the

ablest, independently of his religion, or his caste, or his

nationality, to exercise command under {93} himself, the maintainer

of equal laws, equal justice, for all classes. Such became, as his

mind developed, the principles of Akbar. He has been accused, he was

accused in his life-time, by bigoted Muhammadan writers, of

arrogating to himself the attributes of the Almighty. This charge is

only true in the sense that, in an age and in a country in which

might had been synonymous with right, he did pose as the messenger

from Heaven, the representative on earth of the power of God, to

introduce union, toleration, justice, mercy, equal rights, amongst

the peoples of Hindustan.

His first aim was to bring all India under one sceptre, and to

accomplish this task in a great measure by enlisting in its favour

the several races which he desired to bring within the fold. I have

thought it advisable for the fuller comprehension of his system to

treat the subject in its two aspects, the physical and the moral.

This chapter, then, will chronicle the successive attempts to bring

under one government and one form of law the several states into

which India was then divided. The chapter that follows will deal more

particularly with the moral aspect of the question.

It would be tedious, in a work like this, to follow Akbar in all the

details of his conquests in India. It will suffice to record that,

during the first year of his own personal administration and the

sixth of his actual reign, he re-attached Malwa to his dominions.

Later in the season his generals repelled an attempt {94} made by the

Afghan ruler of Chanar and the country east of the Karamnasa to

attack Jaunpur, whilst Akbar himself, marching by way of Kalpi,

crossed there the Jumna, and proceeded as far as Karrah, not far from

Allahabad, on the right bank of the Ganges. There he was joined by

his generals who held Jaunpur, and thence he returned to Agra. The

year, at its close, witnessed the siege of Merta, a town in the

Jodhpur state, then of considerable importance, beyond Ajmere, and

seventy-six miles to the north-east of the city of Jodhpur. This

expedition was directed by Akbar from Ajmere where he was then

residing, though he confided the execution of it to his generals. The

place was defended with great energy by the Rajput garrison, but, in

the spring of the following year it was surrendered on condition that

the garrison should march out with their horses and arms, but should

leave behind all their property and effects.

In the same year in which Merta fell (1562), the generals of Akbar in

Malwa, pushing westward, added the cities of Bijagarh and Burhanpur

on the Tapti to his dominions. The advantage proved, however, to be

the forerunner of a calamity, for the dispossessed governors of those

towns, combining with the expelled Afghan ruler of Malwa, and aided

by the zamindars of the country, long accustomed to their rule, made

a desperate attack upon the imperial forces. These, laden with the

spoils of Burhanpur, were completely defeated. For the moment Malwa

was lost, but the year did not expire before the {95} Mughal

generals, largely reinforced, had recovered it. The Afghan noble,

whilom Governor of Malwa, after some wanderings, threw himself on the

mercy of Akbar, and, to use the phrase of the chronicler, 'sought a

refuge from the frowns of fortune.' Akbar made him a commander of one

thousand, and a little later promoted him to the mansab (dignity) of

a commander of two thousand. He died in the service of his new

sovereign. The reader will not fail to notice how the principle of

winning over his enemies by assuring to them rank, position, and

consideration, instead of driving them to despair, was constantly

acted upon by Akbar. His design was to unite, to weld together. Hence

he was always generous to the vanquished. He would bring their

strength into his strength, instead of allowing it to become a

strength outside his own. He would make those who would in the first

instance be inclined to resist him feel that conquest by him, or

submission to him, would in no way impair their dignity, but,

ultimately, would increase it. We shall note the working of this

principle more clearly when we come to describe his dealings with the

several chiefs of Rajputana.

A tragic event came to cloud the spring of the eighth year of the

reign of Akbar. I have referred already to the regard and affection

he entertained for the lady who had been his nurse in his infancy,

and who had watched his tender years. It was to a great extent upon

her advice that he had acted in dealing with Bairam. She had a

splendid provision in the {96} palace, and Akbar had provided

handsomely for her sons. The eldest of these, however, fired with

jealousy at the elevation of men whose equal or superior he

considered himself to be, and goaded probably by men of a like nature

to his own, assassinated the Prime Minister as he was sitting in his

public office; then, trusting to the favour which Akbar had always

displayed towards his family and himself, went and stood at the door

of the harem. But for such a man, and for such an act, Akbar had no

mercy. The assassin was cut to pieces, and his dead body was hurled

over the parapet into the moat below. Those who had incited him,

dreading lest their complicity should be discovered, fled across the

Jumna, but they were caught, sent back to Agra, and were ultimately

pardoned. The mother of the chief culprit died forty days later from

grief at her son's conduct.

For some time previously the condition of a portion of the Punjab had

been the cause of some anxiety to Akbar. The Gakkhars, a tribe always

turbulent, and the chiefs of which had never heartily accepted the

Mughal sovereigns, had set at defiance the orders issued for the

disposal of their country by Akbar. They had refused, that is, to

acknowledge the governor he had nominated. The Gakkhars inhabited, as

their descendants inhabit now, that part of the Punjab which may be

described as forming the north-eastern part of the existing district

of Rawal Pindi. To enforce his orders Akbar sent thither an army, and

this army, after some sharp fighting, succeeded in restoring order.

{97} The chief of the Gakkhars was taken prisoner, and died whilst

still under surveillance. Akbar caused to be repressed likewise

disturbances which had arisen in Kabul, and met with promptitude a

conspiracy formed by the favourite of Humayun, Abul Ma'ali, whose

pretentions he had more than once put down, but who was now

returning, puffed up with pride, from a pilgrimage to Mekka.

Concerting a plan with another discontented noble, Abul Ma'ali fell

upon a detachment of the royal army near Narnul, and destroyed it.

Akbar sent troops in pursuit of him, and Abul Ma'ali, terrified, fled

to Kabul, and wrote thence letters full of penitence to Akbar.

Ultimately, that is, early the following year, Abul Ma'ali was taken

prisoner in Badakshan, and strangled.

Up to the spring of 1564 Akbar had not put into execution the designs

which he cherished for establishing the Mughal power in the provinces

to the east of Allahabad. Chanar, then considered the key of those

eastern territories, was held by a slave of the Adel dynasty. This

slave, threatened by one of Akbar's generals, wrote a letter to the

Emperor offering to surrender it. Akbar sent two of his nobles to

take over the fortress, and to them it was surrendered. The

possession of Chanar offered likewise an opening into the district of

Narsinghpur, governed by a Rani, who held her court in the fortress

of Chauragarh. Against her marched the Mughal general, defeated her

in a pitched battle, and added Narsinghpur and portions of what is

now styled the district of {98} Hoshangabad to the imperial

dominions. In the hot weather of the same year, Akbar, under the

pretext of hunting, started for the central districts, when he was

surprised by the advent of the rainy season, and with some difficulty

made his way across the swollen streams to Narwar, then a flourishing

city boasting a circumference of twenty miles. After hunting for some

days in the vicinity of that city he pushed on towards Malwa, and

passing through Rawa and Sarangpur, proceeded towards the famous

Mandu, twenty-six miles south-west of Mhow. The Governor of Mandu, an

Uzbek noble placed there by Akbar, conscious that the Emperor had

grounds for dissatisfaction with him, and placing no trust in a

reassuring message sent him by his sovereign, abandoned the city as

Akbar approached, and took the field with his followers. Akbar sent a

force after him which pursued him to the confines of Gujarat, and

took from him his horses, his elephants, and his wives.

The reception accorded to Akbar in Mandu was of the most gratifying

character. The zamindars of the neighbouring districts crowded in to

pay homage, and the King of distant Khandesh sent an embassy to greet

him. Akbar received the ambassador with distinction. It deserves to

be mentioned, as a characteristic feature of the customs of those

times, that when Akbar honoured the ambassador with a farewell

audience, he placed in his hand a firman addressed to his master,

directing him to send to Mandu any one of his daughters whom he might

consider worthy {99} to attend upon the Emperor. The native historian

adds: 'when Mubarak Shah,' the ruler of Khandesh, 'received this

gracious communication, he was greatly delighted, and he sent his

daughter with a suitable retinue and paraphernalia to his Majesty,

esteeming it a great favour to be allowed to do so.' After a short

stay at Mandu, Akbar returned to Agra, by way of Ujjain, Sarangpur,

Sipri, Narwar, and Gwalior. During the ensuing cold weather he spent

a great part of his time hunting in the Gwalior districts.

There can be but few travellers from the West to India who have not

admired the fortress, built of red sandstone, which is one of the

sights of Agra. At the time of the accession of Akbar there was at

Agra simply a citadel built of brick, ugly in form and ruinous from

decay. Akbar had for some time past resolved to build on its ruins a

fortress which should be worthy of the ruler of an empire, and in the

late spring of 1565 he determined on the plans, and gave the

necessary orders. The work was carried on under the direction of

Kasim Khan, a distinguished officer whom Akbar had made a commander

of three thousand. The building of the fortress took eight years of

continuous labour, and the cost was thirty-five lakhs of rupees. It

is built, as I have said, of red sandstone, the stones being well

joined together and fastened to each other by iron rings which pass

through them. The foundation everywhere reaches water.

The year did not close without an event which afforded Akbar the

opportunity of displaying his {100} decision and prompt action in

sudden emergencies. I have shown how, on his visit to Mandu, the

Uzbek governor of that city had taken fright and rushed into

rebellion; how Akbar had caused him to be pursued and punished. The

treatment of the rebel, though not unduly severe, had spread in the

minds of the Uzbek nobles at the court and in the army the impression

that the Emperor disliked men of that race, and three or four of them

combined to give him a lesson. The rebellion broke out in the autumn

of the year at Jaunpur, the governor of which the Uzbeks had secured

to their interests. Akbar was engaged in elephant-hunting at Narwar

when the news reached him.

He immediately despatched his ablest general with the troops that

were available to aid his loyal officers, whilst he should collect

further troops to follow. He marched about ten days later, reached

Kanauj, received there the submission of one of the rebel leaders,

remained there ten days, waiting till the river, swollen by the

rainfall, should subside. Learning then that the chief who was the

head of the rebellion had proceeded to Lucknow, he promptly followed

him thither with a small but chosen body of troops, and marching

incessantly for four-and-twenty hours, came in sight of that city on

the morning of the second day. As he approached, the rebels fled with

such speed that the horses of the Emperor and his retinue, completely

knocked up with their long march, could not follow them. The rebel

chief then fell back rapidly on Jaunpur, and joining there his

colleagues, quitted that place with them, and {101} crossing the

Gogra at the ford of Narhan, forty miles west-north-west of Chapra,

remained encamped there. Thence they despatched agents into Bengal to

implore the aid of the king of that country.

Meanwhile, one imperial army, led by a general anxious for a

bloodless termination to the dispute, had arrived in front of them,

whilst another, commanded by a fiery and resolute leader, was

marching up from Rajputana. The negotiations which the peaceful

general had commenced had almost concluded, when the fiery leader

arrived, and, declaring the negotiations to be a fraud, insisted upon

fighting. In the battle which followed the imperial forces were

defeated, and fled to re-assemble the day following at Shergarh.

Before this battle had been fought Akbar had confirmed the peace

negotiations with the rebels, and he was not moved from his

resolution when he heard of their victory over his army. He said:

'their faults have been forgiven,' and he sent instructions to his

Amirs to return to court. He then marched himself to Chanar, alike to

plan works for the strengthening of the fortress; to hunt elephants

in the Mirzapur jungles; and to await the further action of the

rebels he had pardoned with arms in their hands. The experiment was

not one to be repeated, for, flushed with their success, the rebel

chiefs broke out anew. Akbar, however, by a skilful disposition of

his forces, compelled their submission, and received them back to

favour. In the course of this year the imperial generals had {102}

taken the fortress of Rotas, in Behar, and ambassadors, sent on a

mission to the king of Orissa, had returned laden with splendid

presents.

The spring of the year 1566 found the Emperor back at Agra. The

native historians record that in these times of peace his great

delight was to spend the evening in the game of chaugan. Chaugan is

the modern polo, which was carried to Europe from India. But Akbar,

whilst playing it in the daytime in the manner in which it is now

played all over the world, devised a method of playing it on the dark

nights which supervene so quickly on the daylight in India. For this

purpose he had balls made of palas wood--a wood which is very light

and which burns for a long time, and set them on fire. He had the

credit of being the keenest chaugan-player of his time.

From this pleasure Akbar was roused by the news of successful

rebellions at Kabul and at Lahore. He marched with all haste towards

the close of the year in the direction of the Sutlej, reached Delhi

in ten days; thence marched to Sirhind; and thence joyfully to

Lahore. Thence he despatched his generals to drive the rebels across

the Indus. This they accomplished, and returned. The troubles at

Kabul were at the same time appeased: but, as a counter-irritant, the

absence of the Emperor so far in the north-west brought about

rebellion at Jaunpur. It was clear that up to this time--the end of

1566--Akbar had been unable successfully to grapple with the

important question how to establish a permanent {103} government in

Hindustan. The eleventh year of his reign, counting from the battle

of Panipat, was now closing, and he had fixed so few roots in the

soil that it was certain that, should a fatal accident befall him,

the succession would again be decided by the sword. The beginning of

the year 1567 found him still at Lahore, engaged in hunting and

similar pleasures. He was roused from these diversions by the

intelligence that the Uzbek nobles whom he had pardoned, had taken

advantage of his absence to break out again. Accordingly he quitted

Lahore on the 22nd of March, and began his return-march to Agra. On

reaching Thuneswar, in Sirhind, he was greatly entertained by a fight

between two sects of Hindu devotees, the Jogis and the Suniasis, for

the possession of the rich harvest of gold, jewels, and stuffs,

brought to the shrine of the saint by pious pilgrims. Another sign of

the instability of his rule awaited him at Delhi, for he found that a

state prisoner had eluded the vigilance of the governor, and that the

governor, apprehensive of the imperial displeasure, had quitted the

city, and broken into rebellion.

Nor, even when he reached Agra, did more reassuring tidings await

him. The country about Kanauj was in a state of rebellion, and it was

clear to him that many of his nobles could not be trusted. In this

emergency he marched to Bhojpur, in the Rai Bareli district, thence

to Rai Bareli. There he learned that the rebels had crossed the

Ganges with the object of proceeding towards Kalpi. There had been

heavy {104} rains and the country was flooded, but Akbar, eager for

action, despatched his main forces to Karrah whilst he hastened with

a body of chosen troops to Manikpur, midway between Partabgarh and

Allahabad. There he crossed the river on an elephant, pushed on with

great celerity, caught the rebels at the village of Manikpur, and

completely defeated them. The principal leaders of the revolt were

killed during or after the battle. From the battle-field, Akbar

marched to Allahabad, then called by its ancient name of Pryaga.

After a visit to Benares and to Jaunpur, in the course of which he

settled the country, he returned to Agra.

Deeming his eastern territories now secure, Akbar turned his

attention to Rajputana. The most ancient of all the rulers of the

kingdoms in that large division of Western India was Udai Singh, Rana

of Mewar, a man possessing a character in which weakness was combined

with great obstinacy. His principal stronghold was the famous

fortress of Chitor, a fortress which had indeed succumbed to

Allah-ud-din Khilji in 1303, but which had regained the reputation of

being impregnable. It stands on a high oblong hill above the river

Banas, the outer wall of the fortifications adapting itself to the

shape of the hill. It was defended by an army of about seven thousand

Rajputs, good soldiers, and commanded by a true and loyal captain. It

was supplied with provisions and abundance of water, and was in all

respects able to stand a long siege.

{105} Akbar himself sat down before the fortress, whilst he sent

another body of troops to make conquests in the vicinity, for the

Rana, despairing of success, had fled to the jungles. But if he

pressed the siege vigorously, the Rajputs defended themselves with

equal courage and obstinacy. Never had Akbar met such sturdy

warriors. As their pertinacity increased, so likewise did his pride

and resolution. At length the breach was reported practicable, and on

a night in the month of March, Akbar ordered the assault. He had a

stand erected for himself, whence he could watch and direct the

operations. As he sat there, his gun in his hand, he observed the

gallant Rajputs assembling in the breach, led by their capable

commander, prepared to give his troops a warm reception. The distance

between his stand and the breach was, as the crow flies, but short,

for the river alone ran between the two.

By the light of the torches, Akbar easily recognised the Rajput

general, and believing him to be within distance, he fired and killed

him on the spot. This fortunate shot, despatched whilst the hostile

parties were approaching one another, so discouraged the Rajputs,

that at the critical moment they made but a poor defence. They

rallied indeed subsequently, but it was too late, and though they

then exerted themselves to the utmost, they could not regain the lost

advantage. When the day dawned, Chitor was in the possession of

Akbar. In gratitude for its victory Akbar, in pursuance of a vow he

had made before he began the siege, made a pilgrimage on {106} foot

to the mausoleum of the first Muhammadan saint of India, Ma'inu-i-din

Chisti of Sijistan, on the summit of the hill of Ajmere. He had not

then emancipated himself from his early training. He remained ten

days at Ajmere, and returned thence to Agra by way of Mewat.

Akbar spent the spring and rainy season at Agra. He then designed the

conquest of the strong fortress of Ranthambor in Jaipur, but whilst

the army he had raised for this purpose was on its march,

disturbances in Gujarat, followed by an invasion of Central India

from that side, compelled Akbar to divert his troops to meet that

danger. He then decided to march in person with another army against

Ranthambor. This he did early in the following year (1569). As soon

as he had compelled the surrender of the fortress, he returned to

Agra, stopping on the way a week at Ajmere, to visit once again the

mausoleum of the saint.

This year he founded Fatehpur-Sikri, the magnificent ruins of which

compel, in the present day, the admiration of the traveller. The

story is thus told by the author of the Tabakat. After stating that

Akbar had had two sons, twins, neither of whom had lived, he goes on

to say that Shaikh Salim Chisti, who resided at Sikri, twenty-two

miles to the south-west of Agra, had promised him a son who should

survive. Full of the hope of the fulfilment of this promise, Akbar,

after his return from Ranthambor, had paid the saint several visits,

remaining there ten to twenty days on each {107} occasion; eventually

he built a palace there on the summit of a rising ground; whilst the

saint commenced a new monastery and a fine mosque, near the royal

mansion. The nobles of the court, fired by these examples, began then

to build houses for themselves.

Whilst his own palace was building one of his wives became pregnant,

and Akbar conveyed her to the dwelling of the holy man. When,

somewhat later, he had conquered Gujarat he gave to the favoured town

the prefix 'Fatehpur' (City of victory). The place has since been

known in history by the joint names of Fatehpur-Sikri. Towards the

end of the year his wife, whom he had sent to reside at Sikri, gave

birth to a son at the house of the saint, who is known in history as

the Emperor Jahangir, though called after the saint by the name of

Salim. His mother was a Rajput princess of Jodhpur. To commemorate

this event Akbar made of Fatehpur-Sikri a permanent royal abode;

built a stone fortification round it, and erected some splendid

edifices. He then made another pilgrimage on foot to the mausoleum of

the saint on the Ajmere hill. Having paid his devotions he proceeded

to Delhi.

Early the following year Akbar marched into Rajputana and halted at

Nagaur, in Jodhpur. There he received the homage of the son of the

Raja of that principality, then the most powerful in Rajputana, and

that of the Raja of Bikaner and his son. As a tribute of his

appreciation of the loyalty of the latter, Akbar took the Raja's

daughter in marriage. He {108} amused himself for some time at Nagaur

in hunting the wild asses which at that time there abounded, and then

proceeded to Dipalpur in the Punjab. There he held a magnificent

durbar, and then, with the dawn of the new year, proceeded to Lahore.

After settling the affairs of the Punjab, he returned to

Fatehpur-Sikri with the intention of devoting the coming year to the

conquest of Gujarat.

The province of Gujarat in Western India included, in the time of

Akbar, the territories and districts of Surat, Broach, Kaira,

Ahmadabad, a great part of what is now Baroda, the territories now

represented by the Mahi Kantha and Rewa Kantha agencies, the Panch

Mahas, Palanpur, Radhanpur, Balisna, Cambay, Khandeah, and the great

peninsula of Kathiawar. This agglomeration of territories had for a

long time had no legitimate master. Parcelled out into districts,

each of which was ruled by a Muhammadan noble alien to the great bulk

of the population, it had been for years the scene of constant civil

war, the chiefs grinding the peasantry to obtain the means wherewith

to obtain the supreme mastery. Sometimes, fired by information of the

weakness of an adjoining province, the chiefs would combine to make

temporary raids. The result was that Gujarat had become the focus of

disorder. The people were oppressed, and the petty tyrants who ruled

over them were bent only on seeking advantages at the expense of

others. Akbar had long felt the results of this anarchy, and he

resolved now to put an end to it for ever.

{109} The expedition of Akbar to Gujarat is the most famous military

exploit of his reign. He was resolved that there should be no mistake

either in its plan or in its execution. For the first time since he

had become ruler of the greater part of India he felt secure as to

the behaviour, during the probable duration of the expedition, of the

conduct of his nobles and his vassals. He set out from Fatehpur-Sikri

at the head of his army in September, 1572, and marching by Sanganer,

eighteen miles south of Jaipur, reached Ajmere the middle of October.

There he stayed two days to visit the mausoleum of the saint, then,

having sent an advanced guard of ten thousand horse to feel the way,

followed with the bulk of the army, and marched on Nagaur,

seventy-five miles to the north-east of Jodhpur. On reaching Nagaur a

courier arrived with the information that a son, later known as

Prince Danyal, had been born to him. He spent there fourteen days in

arranging for the supplies of his army, then pushing on, reached

Patan, on the Saraswati, in November, and Ahmadabad early in the

following month. In the march between the two places he had received

the submission of the chief who claimed to be supreme lord of

Gujarat, but whose authority was barely nominal. At Ahmadabad, then

the first city in Gujarat, Akbar was proclaimed Emperor of Western

India.

There remained, however, to be dealt with many of the chieftains, all

unwilling to renounce the authority they possessed. Amongst these

were the rulers of Broach, of Baroda, and of Surat. No {110} sooner,

then, had the Emperor arranged matters at Ahmadabad for the good

order of the country, than he set out for Cambay, and reached it in

five days. There, we are told by the historians, he gazed for the

first time on the sea. After a stay there of nearly a week, he

marched, in two days, to Baroda. There he completed his arrangements

for the administration of the country, appointing Ahmadabad to be the

capital, and nominating a governor from amongst the nobles who had

accompanied him from Agra. Thence, too, he despatched a force to

secure Broach and Surat. Information having reached him that the

chief of Broach had murdered the principal adherent of the Mughal

cause in that city, and had then made for the interior, passing

within fifteen miles of Baroda, Akbar dashed after him with what

troops he had in hand, and on the second night came in sight of his

camp at Sarsa, on the further side of a little river.

Akbar had then with him but forty horsemen, and, the river being

fordable, he endeavoured to conceal his men until reinforcements

should arrive. These came up in the night to the number of sixty, and

with his force, now increased to a total number of a hundred, Akbar

forded the river to attack ten times their number. The rebel leader,

instead of awaiting the attack in the town, made for the open, to

give a better chance to his preponderating numbers. Akbar carried the

town with a rush, and then dashed in pursuit. But the country was

intercepted by lanes, {111} bordered on both sides by cactus hedges,

and the horsemen of Akbar were driven back into a position in which

but three of them could fight abreast, the enemy being on either side

of the cactus hedges. The Emperor was in front of his men, having by

his side the gallant Rajput prince, Raja Bhagwan Das of Jaipur, whose

sister he had married, and the Raja's nephew and destined successor,

Man Singh, one of the most brilliant warriors of the day. The three

were in the greatest danger, for the enemy made tremendous efforts to

break in upon them. But the cactus hedges, hitherto a bar to their

formation, now proved a defence which the enemy could not pass. And

when Bhagwan Das had slain his most prominent adversary with his

spear, and Akbar and the nephew had disposed of two others, the three

took advantage of the momentary confusion of the enemy to charge

forward, and aided by the desperate gallantry of their men, roused by

the danger of their sovereign to extraordinary exertions, to force

them to flight. The followers of the rebel chief, sensible that they

were engaged in a losing cause, displayed nothing like the firmness

and persistency of the soldiers of Akbar. They dropped off as they

could find the opportunity, and the rebel chief himself, abandoned by

his following, made his way, as best he could, past Ahmadabad and

Disa to Sirohi in Rajputana.

Broach meanwhile had fallen, and there remained only Surat. Against

this town, so well known to {112} English traders in the days of his

son and grandson, Akbar marched in person on his return from the

expedition just related. Against the breaching material employed in

those days Surat was strong. But the Emperor pressed the siege with

vigour, and after a patient progress of a month and seventeen days,

the garrison, reduced to extremities, surrendered. He remained at

Surat long enough to complete the settlement of the affairs of the

province of Gujarat, and then began his return-march to Agra. He

arrived there on the 4th of June, 1573, having been absent on the

expedition about nine months.

Whilst Akbar had been besieging Surat, the rebel chief whom he had

defeated at Sarsa, and who had fled to Sirohi, had been bestirring

himself to make mischief. Joined by another powerful malcontent noble

he advanced against Patan, met near that place the Emperor's forces,

and had almost beaten them in the field, when, his own troops

dispersing to plunder, the Mughal forces rallied, pierced the enemy's

centre, and turned defeat into victory. The news of this achievement

reached Akbar whilst he was still before Surat. The rebel leader,

still bent on doing all the mischief in his power, made his way

through Rajputana to the Punjab, encountering two or three defeats on

his way, but always escaping with his life, and plundering, as he

marched, Panipat, Sonpat, and Karnal. In the Punjab he was

encountered by the imperial troops, was defeated, and, after some

exciting adventures, was wounded by a party of {113} fishermen near

Multan, taken prisoner, and died from the effect of his wound. He was

a good riddance, for he was a masterful man. It may here be added

that during this year the Mughal troops attempted, but failed to take

the strong fortress of Kangra, in the Jalandhar Duab. The besiegers

had reduced the garrison to extremities when they were called off by

the invasion of the adventurer whose death near Multan I have

recorded. Kangra did not fall to the Mughal till the reign of the son

of Akbar.

Akbar had quitted the province of Gujarat believing that the conquest

of the province was complete, and that he had won by his measures the

confidence and affection of the people. But he had not counted

sufficiently on the love of rule indwelling in the hearts of men who

have once ruled. He had not been long at Agra, then, before the

dispossessed lordlings of the province began to raise forces, and to

harass the country. Determined to nip the evil in the bud, Akbar

prepared a second expedition to Western India, and despatching his

army in advance, set out, one Sunday morning in September, riding on

a swift dromedary, to join it. Without drawing rein, he rode seventy

miles to Toda, nearly midway between Jaipur and Ajmere. On the

morning of the third day he reached Ajmere, paid his usual devotions

at the tomb of the saint; then, mounting his horse in the evening,

continued his journey, and joined his army at Pali on the road to

Disa. Near Patan he was joined by some troops collected by his

lieutenants, {114} who had awaited the arrival of their sovereign to

advance.

His force was small in comparison with that which the rebel chiefs

had managed to enlist, but the men who formed it were the cream of

his army. The celerity of his movements too had served him well. The

rebels had not heard that he had quitted Agra when he was amongst

them. They were in fact sleeping in their tents near Ahmadabad when

Akbar, who had made the journey from Agra in nine days, was upon

them.

That there was chivalry in those days is shown by the remark of the

native historian, the author of the Tabakat-i-Akbari, 'that the

feeling ran through the royal ranks that it was unmanly to fall upon

an enemy unawares, and that they would wait till he was roused.' The

trumpeters, therefore, were ordered to sound. The chief rebel leader,

whose spies had informed him that fourteen days before the Emperor

was at Agra, still declared his belief that the horsemen before him

could not belong to the royal army as there were no elephants with

them. However he prepared for battle. The Emperor, still chivalrous,

waited till he was ready, then dashed into and crossed the river,

formed on the opposite bank, and 'charged the enemy like a fierce

tiger.' Another body of Mughal troops took them simultaneously in

flank. The shock was irresistible. The rebels were completely

defeated, their leader wounded and taken prisoner.

An hour later, another hostile body, about five {115} thousand

strong, appeared in sight. These too were disposed of, and their

leader was killed. In the battle and in the pursuit the rebels lost

about two thousand men. Akbar then advanced to Ahmadabad, rested

there five days, engaged in rewarding the deserving, and in arranging

for the permanent security of the province. He then marched to

Mahmudabad, a town in the Kaira district, and thence to Sirohi. From

Sirohi he went direct to Ajmere, visited there the mausoleum of the

famous saint, thence, marching night and day, stopped at a village

about fourteen miles from Jaipur to arrange with Raja Todar Mall,

whom he met there, one of the ablest of his officers, afterwards to

become Diwan, or Chancellor, of the Empire, regarding the mode of

levying the revenues of Gujarat. From that village the Emperor

proceeded direct to Fatehpur-Sikri, where he arrived in triumph,

after an absence of forty-three days.

His plan of bringing under his sceptre the whole of India had so far

matured that he ruled now, at the end of the eighteenth year of his

reign, over North-western, Central, and Western India, inclusive of

the Punjab and Kabul. Eastward, his authority extended to the banks

of the Karamnasa. Beyond that river lay Behar and Bengal,

independent, and under certain circumstances threatening danger. He

had fully resolved, then, that unless the unforeseen should occur,

the nineteenth year of his reign should be devoted to the conquest of

Bengal and the states tributary to Bengal. Before setting out on the

{116} expedition, however, he paid another visit to the tomb of the

saint on the hill of Ajmere.

I have written much in the more recent pages of the marches of Akbar,

and the progress of his armies, but up to the present I have not

referred to the principle on which those movements were made. There

have been warriors, even within the memory of living men, who have

made war support war. Upon that principle acted the Khorasani and

Afghan barbarians who invaded India when the Mughal power was

tottering to its fall. But that principle was not the principle of

Akbar. Averse to war, except for the purpose of completing the

edifice he was building, and which, but for such completion, would,

he well knew, remain unstable, liable to be overthrown by the first

storm, he took care that neither the owners nor the tillers of the

soil should be injuriously affected by his own movements, or by the

movements of his armies. With the object of carrying out this

principle, he ordered that when a particular plot of ground was

decided upon as an encampment, orderlies should be posted to protect

the cultivated ground in its vicinity. He further appointed assessors

whose duty it should be to examine the encamping ground after the

army had left it, and to place the amount of any damage done against

the government claim for revenue. The historian of the

Tabakat-i-Akbari adds that this practice became a rule in all his

campaigns; 'and sometimes even bags of money were given to these

{117} inspectors, so that they might at once estimate and satisfy the

claims of the raiyats and farmers, and obviate any interference with

the revenue collectors.' This plan, which is in all essentials the

plan of the western people who virtually succeeded to the Mughal,

deprived war of its horrors for the people over whose territories it

was necessary to march.

Whilst Akbar is paying a visit of twelve days' duration to the tomb

of the saint at Ajmere, it is advisable that we examine for a moment

the position of affairs in Behar and Bengal.

The Afghan king of Bengal and Behar, who sat upon the joint throne at

the time of the Mughal re-conquest of the North-western Provinces,

had after a time acknowledged upon paper the suzerainty of Akbar. But

it was, and it had remained a mere paper acknowledgment. He had paid

no tribute, and he had rendered no homage. During the second

expedition of Akbar to Gujarat this prince had died. His son and

immediate successor had been promptly murdered by his nobles, and

these, constituting only a fraction, though a powerful fraction, of

the court, had raised a younger brother, Daud Khan, to the throne.

But Daud was a man who cared only for pleasure, and his accession was

the cause of the revolt of a powerful nobleman of the Lodi family,

who, raising his standard in the fort of Rohtasgarh, in the Shahabad

district of Behar, declared his independence. A peace, however, was

patched up between them, and Daud, taking {118} advantage of this,

and of the trust reposed in him by the Lodi nobleman, caused the

latter to be seized and put to death. As soon as this intelligence

reached the Mughal governor of Jaunpur, that nobleman, who had been

directed by Akbar to keep a sharp eye on the affairs of Behar, and to

act as circumstances might dictate, crossed the Karamnasa, and

marched on the fortified city of Patna, into which Daud, distrustful

of meeting the Mughals in the field, had thrown himself. Such was the

situation very shortly after the return of Akbar from Gujarat.

Desirous of directing the campaign himself, Akbar despatched orders

to his lieutenant to suspend operations till he should arrive, then,

making the hurried visit to Ajmere of which I have spoken, he

hastened with a body of troops by water to Allahabad. Not halting

there, he continued his journey, likewise by water, to Benares,

stayed there three days, then, taking to boat again, reached the

point where the Gumti flows into the Ganges. Thence, pending the

receipt of news from his lieutenant, he resolved to ascend the Gumti

to Jaunpur.

On his way thither, however, he received a despatch from his

lieutenant, urging him to advance with all speed. Directing the

boatmen to continue their course with the young princes and the

ladies to Jaunpur, Akbar at once turned back, reached the point where

he had left his troops, and directing that they should march along

the banks in sight of the boats, descended to Chausa, the place

memorable, the reader may recollect, for the defeat of his {119}

father by Sher Khan. Here a despatch reached him to the effect that

the enemy had made a sortie from Patna, which had caused much damage

to the besiegers. Akbar pushed on therefore, still by water, and

reached the besieging army on the seventh day.

The next day he called a council of war. At this he expressed his

opinion that before assaulting the fort it was advisable that the

besiegers should occupy Hajipur, a town at the confluence of the

Gandak and the Ganges, opposite to Patna. This course was adopted,

and the next day Hajipur fell. Daud was so terrified by this success,

and by the evident strength of the besieging army, that he evacuated

Patna the same night, and fled across the Punpun, near its junction

with the Ganges at Fatwa. Akbar entered the city in triumph the next

morning, but, anxious to capture Daud, remained there but four hours;

then, leaving his lieutenant in command of the army, followed with a

well-mounted detachment in pursuit of the enemy. Swimming the Punpun

on horseback he speedily came up with Daud's followers, and captured

elephant after elephant, until on reaching Daryapur, he counted two

hundred and sixty-five of those animals. Halting at Daryapur, he

directed two of his trusted officers to continue the pursuit. These

pressed on for fourteen miles further, then it became clear that Daud

had evaded them, and they returned.

The conquest of Patna had given Behar to Akbar. He stayed then at

Daryapur six days to constitute the {120} government of the province,

then nominating to the chief office the successful lieutenant who had

planned the campaign, he left him to follow it up whilst he should

return to Jaunpur. At that place he stayed thirty-three days, engaged

in perfecting arrangements for the better administration of the

country. With this view he brought Jaunpur, Benares, Chanar, and

other mahalls in the vicinity, directly under the royal exchequer,

and constituted the newly acquired territories south of the Karamnasa

a separate government.

Having done this, he proceeded to Cawnpur, on his way to Agra. At

Cawnpur he stayed four days, long enough to receive information that

his general in Bengal had occupied, successively, Monghyr, Bhagalpur,

Garhi, and Tanda on the opposite side of the Ganges to Gaur, the

ancient and famous Hindu capital of Bengal, and that he was preparing

to push on further. It may be added that he carried out this

resolution with vigour, and followed up Daud relentlessly, defeating

him at Bajhura, and finally compelling him to surrender at Cuttack.

With the surrender of this prince, the conquest of Bengal might be

regarded as achieved.

Very much elated with the good news received at Cawnpur, Akbar,

deeming the campaign in Bengal as virtually terminated, pushed on to

Delhi, devoted there a few days to hunting, and then made another

journey to Ajmere, hunting as he marched. At Narnul he received

visits from his governors of the Punjab and of Gujarat, and had the

satisfaction of learning {121} that everywhere his rule was taking

root in the hearts of the people. After the exchange of ideas with

these noblemen, he pushed on to Ajmere, made his pilgrimage to the

tomb of the saint, caused to be repressed the rising of a petty chief

in the jungles of Jodhpur, and then returned to his favourite

residence at Fatehpur-Sikri.

He had noticed, on his many journeys, that a very great part of the

territories he had traversed remained uncultivated. The evil was

neither to be attributed to the nature of the soil, which was rich,

nor to the laziness of the people. Sifting the matter to the bottom,

Akbar came to the conclusion that the fault rather lay with the

administration, which placed upon the land a tax which rendered

cultivation prohibitive to the poor man. The evil, he thought, might

be remedied if some plan could be devised for dividing the profits of

the first year between the government and the cultivator. After a

thorough examination of the whole question, he arranged that the

several parganas, or subdivisions of the districts, should be

examined, and that those subdivisions which contained so much land

as, on cultivation, would yield ten million of tankas,[1] should be

divided off, and given in charge of an honest and intelligent officer

who was {122} to receive the name of Karori. The clerks and

accountants of the exchequer were to make arrangements with these

officers and send them to their respective districts, where, by

vigilance and attention, the uncultivated land might in the course of

three years be brought into a state of production, and the revenues

recovered for the government. This scheme was carried out, and was

found to realise all the advantages it promised.

[Footnote 1: Blochmann, in his _Ain-i-Akbari_ (note, p. 16), states

that, according to Abulfazl, the weight of one dam was five tanks. As

the copper coin known as 'dam' was one fortieth part of a rupee

(Ibid. p. 31), it follows that ten million of tankas would equal

50,000 rupees. A pargana is a division of land nearly equalling a

barony. A parganadar was called 'lord of a barony.']

The nineteenth year of the reign of Akbar was thus in all respects

save one a glorious year for the young empire. Bengal and Behar had

been added to North-western, Central, and Western India. Practically,

in fact, all India north of the Vindhya range acknowledged the

supremacy of the son of Humayun. The exception to the general

prosperity was caused by a terrible famine and pestilence in Western

India, the effects of which were most severely felt. Grain rose to a

fabulous price, 'and horses and cows had to feed upon the bark of

trees.' The famine and pestilence lasted six months.

The early part of the following year, 1575, was occupied with the

pursuit of Daud and the conquest of Orissa. I have already stated how

the Afghan prince was defeated at Bajhura, midway between Mughalmari

and Jaleswar, and how, pursued to and invested in Cuttack, he had

surrendered. The treaty concluded with him provided that he should

govern the province of Orissa in the name and on behalf of the

Emperor Akbar. It may be added that Daud did not keep {123} the faith

he plighted on this occasion. He took the first propitious occasion

to rebel, and two years later was defeated in a great battle by the

Mughal general. He was taken prisoner, and in punishment of his

treason his head was severed from his body on the field of battle.

For some time, however, Bengal and Orissa continued to require great

vigilance and prompt action on the part of the Mughal administrators.

The other principal events of this year were the building by the

Emperor at Fatehpur-Sikri of an Ibadat-khana, or palace for the

reception of men of learning, genius, and solid acquirements. The

building was divided into four halls: the western to be used by

Saiyids, or descendants of the Prophet: the southern by the learned,

men who had studied and acquired knowledge: the northern by those

venerable for their wisdom and their subjection to inspiration. The

eastern hall was devoted to the nobles and officers of state, whose

tastes were in unison with those of one or other of the classes

referred to. When the building was finished, the Emperor made it a

practice to repair there every Friday night and on the nights of holy

days, and spend the night in the society of the occupants of the

halls, moving from one to the other and conversing. As a rule, the

members of each hall used to present to him one of their number whom

they considered most worthy of the notice and bounty of the Emperor.

The visits were always made opportunities for the distribution of

largesses, and scarcely one of {124} the guests ever went empty away.

The building was completed by the end of the year.

The following year was uneventful, but the year 1577 was marked by

that rebellion in Orissa under Daud of which I have already spoken.

The campaign was stirring whilst it lasted, but the death of Daud and

his uncle put an end to it.

This year, likewise, there was trouble in Rajputana. Alone of all the

sovereigns of the territories known by that name, the Rana of Mewar

had refused the matrimonial alliance offered to his female relatives

by Akbar. Descended, as he believed, from the immortal gods, he

regarded such an alliance as a degradation. He refused it then,

whilst he was yet struggling for existence. He refused it, though he

saw the Rajput prince whom he most hated, the Raja of Jodhpur,

enriched, in consequence of his compliance, by the acquisition of

four districts, yielding an ample revenue. He remained obdurate,

defying the power of Akbar. Rana Udai Singh had in 1568 lost his

capital, and had fled to the jungles of Rajpipla, and there had died

in 1572.

His son, Partap Singh, inherited all his obstinacy, and many of the

noble qualities of his grandfather, the famous Sanga Rana. Without a

capital, without resources, his kindred and clansmen dispirited by

the reverses of his house, yet sympathising with him in his refusal

to ally himself with a Muhammadan, Partap Singh had established

himself at Kombalmir, in the Aravallis, and had endeavoured to

organise the country for a renewed struggle. Some {125} information

of his plans seems to have reached the ears of Akbar whilst he was

paying his annual visit to Ajmere in 1576-7, and he despatched his

most trusted general, also a Rajput, the Man Singh of Jaipur, whom we

have seen fighting by his side in Gujarat, with five thousand horse,

to beat him up. The two opposing forces met at Huldighat, called also

Gogandah, in December 1576. The battle which followed terminated in

the complete defeat of the Rana, who, when the day was lost, fled to

the Aravalli hills. To deprive him of all possible resources Akbar

despatched a party into the hills, with instructions to lay waste the

country whilst pursuing. Akbar himself entered Mewar, arranged the

mode of its administration; then proceeded to Malwa, encamped on its

western frontier, arranged the administration of the territories

dependent upon the city of Burhanpur, and improved that of Gujarat.

To these matters he devoted the years 1577-8. He then marched for the

Punjab.

A circumstance, interesting to the people who now hold supreme sway

in India, occurred to the Emperor on his way to the Punjab. He had

reached Delhi, and had even proceeded a march beyond it, when a

certain Haji[2] who had visited Europe, 'brought with him fine goods

and fabrics for his Majesty's inspection.' The chronicler does not

state more on the subject than the extract I have made, and we are

left to imagine the part of Europe whence the fabrics came, and the

impression they made. Akbar stayed but a short time {126} in the

Punjab, then returned to Delhi, paid then his annual visit to Ajmere,

and stopping there but one night, rode, accompanied by but nine

persons, at the rate of over a hundred miles a day to Fatehpur-Sikri,

arriving there the evening of the third day.

[Footnote 2: A Haji is a Musalman who has made the pilgrimage to

Mekka.]

The following year, 1580, was remarkable for the fact that the empire

attained the highest degree of prosperity up to that time. Bengal was

not only tranquil, but furnished moneys to the imperial exchequer.

The ruler of Mewar was still being hunted by the imperial troops, but

in no other part of India was the sound of arms heard.

In the course of his journeys Akbar had noticed how the imposition of

inland tolls, justifiable so long as the several provinces of

Hindustan were governed by rival rulers, tended only, now that so

many provinces were under one head, to perpetuate differences. Early

in 1581, then, he abolished the tamgha, or inland tolls, throughout

his dominions. The same edict proclaimed likewise the abolition of

the jizya, a capitation tax imposed by the Afghan rulers of India

upon those subjects who did not follow the faith of Muhammad. It was

the Emperor's noble intention that thought should be free; that every

one of his subjects should worship after his own fashion and

according to his own convictions, and he carried out this principle

to the end of his days. The most important political event of the

year was the rebellion of a body of disaffected nobles in Bengal.

Acting without much cohesion they were defeated and dispersed.

{127} The year following, 1582, Akbar marched at the head of an army

to the Punjab to repulse an invasion made from Kabul by his own

brother, Muhammad Hakim Mirza. The rebel brother had arrived close to

Lahore before Akbar had reached Panipat. The news, however, of the

march of Akbar produced upon him the conviction that his invasion

must miscarry. He accordingly retreated from Lahore, and fell back on

Kabul. Akbar followed him by way of Sirhind, Kalanaur, and Rotas;

then crossed the Indus at the point where Attock now stands, giving,

as he crossed the river, instructions for the erection of a fortress

at that place.

He advanced on to Peshawar, and pushed forward a division of his army

under his son, Prince Murad, to recover Kabul. Murad was a young man,

tall and thin, with a livid complexion, but much given to drink, from

the effects of which he and his brother, Prince Danyal, eventually

died. Marching very rapidly, he encountered the army of his uncle at

Khurd-Kabul and totally defeated him. Akbar had followed him with a

supporting army, and entered Kabul three days after him. There he

remained three weeks, then, having pardoned his brother and

re-bestowed upon him the government of Kabul, he returned by way of

the Khaibar to Lahore, settled the government of the Punjab, and then

marched, by way of Delhi, to Fatehpur-Sikri. 'He now,' writes the

chronicler, 'remained for some time at Fatehpur, administering

justice, dispensing charity, and arranging public business.'

{128} Apparently he continued to reside there throughout the year

following. Rebellion was still smouldering in Bengal, but the Emperor

was represented there by capable officers who reported constantly to

him, and to whom he as constantly despatched instructions. The

disaffection was not very serious, but it was harassing and

interfered greatly with the collection of the revenues.

The beginning of 1584 found Akbar still at Fatehpur-Sikri. The

principal events of the year were, the pacification of Bengal; the

outbreak and suppression of a rebellion in Gujarat; the revolt of the

ruler of Asirgarh and Burhanpur; disturbances in the Deccan; and the

death of the brother of Akbar, the then ruler of Kabul. The revolts

were put down and a new governor was sent to Kabul. Prosperity

reigned over the empire when the year closed.

Among the firmest of the protected allies of the Emperor was Bhagwan

Das, Raja of Jaipur, who had not only himself rendered splendid

military service to Akbar, but whose nephew, Man Singh, held a very

high command in his armies. At the period at which we have arrived

this Rajput prince was governor of the Punjab. From his family Akbar

now selected a wife for his son, Prince Salim, afterwards the Emperor

Jahangir. The marriage was celebrated at Fatehpur-Sikri, with great

ceremony and amid great rejoicings. Until this reign the Rajput

princes had scornfully rejected the idea of a matrimonial alliance

with princes of the Muhammadan faith. But it was the {129} desire of

Akbar to weld: to carry into action the cardinal principle that

differences of race and religion made no difference in the man. He

had many prejudices to overcome, especially on the part of the Rajput

princes, and to the last he could not conquer the obstinate

resistance of the Rana of Mewar.

The others were more complaisant. They recognised in Akbar the

founder of a set of principles such as had never been heard before in

India. In his eyes merit was merit, whether evinced by a Hindu prince

or by an Uzbek Musalman. The race and creed of the meritorious man

barred neither his employment in high positions nor his rise to

honour. Hence, men like Bhagwan Das, Man Singh, Todar Mall, and

others, found that they enjoyed a consideration under this Muhammadan

sovereign far greater and wider-reaching than that which would have

accrued to them as independent rulers of their ancestral dominions.

They governed imperial provinces and commanded imperial armies. They

were admitted to the closest councils of the prince whose main object

was to obliterate all the dissensions and prejudices of the past,

and, without diminishing the real power of the local princes who

entered into his scheme, to weld together, to unite under one supreme

head, without loss of dignity and self-respect to anyone, the

provinces till then disunited and hostile to one another.

One of the means which Akbar employed to this end was that of

marriage between himself, his family, {130} and the daughters of the

indigenous princes. There was, he well knew, no such equaliser as

marriage. The Rajput princes could not fail to feel that their

relationship to the heir to the throne, often to the throne itself,

assured their position. When they reflected on the condition of

Hindustan prior to his rule; how the Muhammadan conquests of the

preceding five centuries had introduced strife and disorder without

cohesion, and that this man, coming upon them as a boy, inexperienced

and untried in the art of ruling, had introduced order and good

government, toleration and justice, wherever he conquered; that he

conquered only that he might introduce those principles; that he made

no distinction between men on account of their diversity of race or

of religious belief; they, apt to believe in the incarnation of the

deity, must have recognised something more than ordinarily human,

something approaching to the divine and beneficent, in the conduct of

Akbar.

His toleration was so absolute, his trust, once given, so thorough,

his principles so large and so generous, that, despite the prejudices

of their birth, their religion, their surroundings, they yielded to

the fascination. And when, in return, Akbar asked them to renounce

one long-standing prejudice which went counter to the great principle

which they recognised as the corner-stone of the new system, the

prejudice which taught them to regard other men, because they were

not Hindus, as impure and unclean, they all, with one marked

exception, gave way. They recognised that {131} a principle such as

that was not to be limited; that their practical renunciation of that

portion of their narrow creed which forbade marriages with those of a

different race, could not but strengthen the system which was giving

peace and prosperity to their country, honour and consideration to

themselves.

It was in the beginning of the thirty-first year of his reign that

Akbar heard of the death of his brother at Kabul, and that the

frontier province of Badakshan had been overrun by the Uzbeks, who

also threatened Kabul. The situation was grave, and such as, he

concluded, imperatively required his own presence. Accordingly, in

the middle of November, he set out with an army for the Punjab,

reached the Sutlej at the end of the following month, and marched

straight to Rawal Pindi. Learning there that affairs at Kabul were

likely to take a direction favourable to his interests, he marched to

his new fort of Attock, despatched thence one force under Bhagwan Das

to conquer Kashmir, another to chastise the Baluchis, and a third to

move against Swat. Of these three expeditions, the last met with

disaster. The Yusufzais not only repulsed the first attack of the

Mughals, but when reinforcements, sent by Akbar under his special

favourite, Raja Birbal, joined the attacking party, they too were

driven back with a loss of 8,000 men, amongst whom was the Raja.[3]

It was the {132} severest defeat the Mughal troops had ever

experienced. To repair it, the Emperor despatched his best commander,

Raja Todar Mall, supported by Raja Man Singh, of Jaipur. These

generals manoeuvred with great caution, supporting their advance by

stockades, and eventually completely defeated the tribes in the

Khaibar Pass.

[Footnote 3: Raja Birbal was a Brahman, a poet, and a skilful

musician. He was noted for his liberality and his _bonhomie_. 'His

short verses, bon mots, and jokes,' writes Blochmann (_Ain-i-Akbari_,

p. 405) 'are still in the mouths of the people of Hindustan.']

Meanwhile, the expedition sent against Kashmir had been but a degree

more successful. The commanders of it had reached the Pass of

Shuliyas, and had found it blockaded by the Musalman ruler of the

country. They waited for supplies for some days, but the rain and

snow came on, and before they could move there came the news of the

defeat inflicted by the Yusufzais. This deprived them of what

remained to them of nerve, and they hastened to make peace with the

ruler of Kashmir, on the condition of his becoming a nominal

tributary, and then returned to Akbar. The Emperor testified his

sense of their want of enterprise by according to them a very cold

reception, and forbidding them to appear at court. But the mind of

Akbar could not long harbour resentment, and he soon forgave them.

Of the three expeditions, that against the Baluchis alone was

immediately successful. These hardy warriors submitted without

resistance to the Mughal Emperor. As soon as the efforts of Todar

Mall and Man Singh had opened the Khaibar Pass, Akbar appointed the

latter, the nephew and heir to the Jaipur Raja, to be Governor of

Kabul, and sent {133} him thither with a sufficient force, other

troops being despatched to replace him in the Yusufzai country, and

Peshawar being strongly occupied. Akbar had himself returned to

Lahore. Thence he directed a second expedition against Kashmir. As

this force approached the Passes, in the summer of 1587, a rebellion

broke out against the actual ruler in Srinagar. The imperial force

experienced then no difficulty in entering and conquering the

country, which thus became a portion of the Mughal empire, and, in

the reign of the successor of Akbar, the summer residence of the

Mughal sovereigns of India. It may here be mentioned that to reach

Jamrud, at the entrance of the Khaibar Pass, Man Singh had to fight

and win another battle with the hill-tribes. He reached Kabul,

however, and established there a stable administration. The Kabulis

and the heads of the tribes, however, complained to Akbar that the

rule of a Rajput prince was not agreeable to them, whereupon Akbar

translated Man Singh in a similar capacity to Bengal, which just then

especially required the rule of a strong hand, and replaced him at

Kabul by a Musalman. He announced at the same time his intention of

paying a visit to that dependency.

First of all, he secured possession of Sind (1588); then, in the

spring of the following year, set out for Kashmir. On reaching

Bhimbar, he left there the ladies of his harem with Prince Murad, and

rode express to Srinagar. He remained there, visiting {134} the

neighbourhood, till the rainy season set in, when he sent his harem

to Rotas. They joined him subsequently at Attock on his way to Kabul.

The Passes to that capital were open, all opposition on the part of

the hill-tribes having ceased, so Akbar crossed the Indus at Attock,

and had an easy journey thence to Kabul. He stayed there two months,

visiting the gardens and places of interest. 'All the people, noble

and simple, profited by his presence.'[4] He was still at Kabul when

news reached him of the death of Raja Todar Mall (November 10, 1589).

The same day another trusted Hindu friend, Raja Bhagwan Das of

Jaipur, also died. Akbar made then new arrangements for the

governments of Kabul, Gujarat, and Jaunpur, and returned towards

Hindustan.

[Footnote 4: Elliot, vol. v. p. 458.]

He had already, as I have stated, arranged for the government of

Bengal. He reached Lahore on his home journey in the beginning of

1590. Whilst residing there, information reached him that his newly

appointed Governor of Gujarat, the son of his favourite nurse, had

engaged in hostilities with Kathiawar and Cutch. These hostilities

eventuated in the addition of those two provinces to the Emperor's

dominions, and in the suicide of the prince of Afghan descent, who

had fomented all the disturbances in Western India.[5] The Emperor

took advantage of his stay at Lahore to direct the more {135}

complete pacification of Sind, affairs in which province had taken a

disadvantageous turn. The perfect conquest of the province proved

more difficult than had been anticipated. It required large

reinforcements of troops, and the display of combined firmness and

caution to effect the desired result. The campaign took two years,

and, during that time, Kashmir had revolted.

[Footnote 5: Vide Blochmann's _Ain-i-Akbari_, p. 326.]

The Emperor during those two years had had his head-quarters at

Lahore. No sooner did he hear that the success in Sind was complete,

than Akbar, who, expecting the event, had sent on the bulk of his

forces towards Bhimbar, remaining himself hunting on the banks of the

Chenab, set out to rejoin his main body. On his way to it he learned

that his advanced guard had forced one of the Passes, notwithstanding

fierce opposition. This event decided the war, for the soldiers of

the rebel chief, resenting his action, fell upon him during the

night, killed him, and cut off his head, which they sent to Akbar.

With the death of this man all opposition ceased, and Akbar, riding

on to Srinagar, stayed there eight days, settling the administration,

and then proceeded by way of the gorge of Baramula to Rotas, and

thence to Lahore. There he received information that his lieutenant

in Bengal, the Raja Man Singh, had definitively annexed the province

of Orissa to the imperial dominions. He had despatched thence to

Lahore a hundred and twenty elephants, captured in that province, as

a present to the Emperor.

{136} The attempt to bring into the imperial scheme the Deccan

provinces south of the Vindhyan range, followed the next year, and

continued for eight years later. On the whole it was successful. The

strong places, Daulatabad, Kherwa, Nasik, Asirgarh, and Ahmadnagar,

opened their gates, after long sieges, to the imperial arms. And,

although the territories dependent upon Ahmadnagar were not entirely

subdued till 1637, the position acquired by Akbar gave him a

preponderance which the Mughals retained for at least a century.

The campaign in Southern India was remarkable for three facts. The

first was the dissensions of the generals sent from different parts

of India to co-operate independently in the conquest, dissensions

which necessitated, first, the despatch thither from Agra of the

Emperor's confidant, Abulfazl, and afterwards, the journey thither of

Akbar himself; secondly, the death, from excessive drinking, of the

Emperor's son, Prince Murad, at Jalna; thirdly, the murder of

Abulfazl, on his return to Agra, at the instigation of Prince Salim,

the eldest surviving son of Akbar and his heir apparent.

Akbar had held his court for fourteen years at Lahore when, in 1598,

the necessities of the position in Southern India forced him to march

thither. He had compelled the surrender of Ahmadnagar and Asirgarh,

when, nominating Prince Danyal to be governor in Khandesh and Berar,

and Abulfazl to complete the conquest of the territories dependent

{137} upon Ahmadnagar, he marched in the spring of 1601 towards Agra.

The circumstances which required the presence of Akbar at Agra were

of a very painful character. Prince Salim had from his earliest youth

caused him the greatest anxiety. Nor had the anxiety been lessened as

the boy approached manhood. Salim, better known to posterity as the

Emperor Jahangir, was naturally cruel, and he appeared incapable of

placing the smallest restraint on his passions. He hated Abulfazl,

really because he was jealous of his influence with his father;

avowedly because he regarded him as the leading spirit who had caused

Akbar to diverge from the narrow doctrines of the bigoted

Muhammadans. Akbar had hoped for a moment that the despatch of

Abulfazl to Southern India would appease the resentment of his son,

and when he decided to proceed thither himself he had nominated Salim

as his successor, and had confided to him, with the title of Viceroy

of Ajmere, the task of finishing the war with the Rana of Mewar,

which had broken out again. He had further studied his partialities

by despatching the renowned Man Singh, his relation by marriage, to

assist him.

The two princes were already on their march towards Mewar when

information reached them that a rebellion had broken out in Bengal,

of which province Man Singh was Viceroy. Man Singh was therefore

compelled to march at once to repress the outbreak. Left without a

counsellor, and commanding a {138} considerable force, Prince Salim

resolved to take advantage of the absence of his father in the south

to make a bold stroke for the crown. Renouncing, then, his march on

Mewar, he hurried with his force to Agra, and when the commandant of

the imperial fortress, loyal to his master, shut its gates in his

face, hastened to Allahabad, occupied the fort, seized the provinces

of Oudh and Behar, and assumed the title of King.

It was the news of these occurrences which drew Akbar from the

Deccan. Attributing the action of Salim to the violence of a temper

which had ever been impatient of control, he resolved rather to guide

than to compel him. Accordingly he wrote him a letter, in which,

assuring him of his continued love if he would only return to his

allegiance, he warned him of the consequences of continued

disobedience. When this letter reached Salim, Akbar was approaching

Agra at the head of an army of warriors, few in number, but the

chosen of the empire. Salim, then, recognising that his position was

absolutely untenable, and that if he persisted it might cost him the

succession, replied in the most submissive terms. His conduct,

however, did not correspond to his words. Informed, somewhat later,

that the bulk of the imperial army was still in the Deccan, he

marched to Itawa, levying troops as he proceeded, with the intention

of waiting upon his father at the head of an imposing force. But

Akbar was not deceived. He sent his son an order {139} to choose one

of two courses; either to come to Agra slightly attended, or to

return to Allahabad.

Prince Salim chose the latter course, receiving the promise, it is

believed, that he should receive the grant of Bengal and Orissa. At

any rate, he did receive the grant of those provinces. We cannot say,

at this time, how much Akbar was influenced in his course by the

consciousness of the comparative weakness of his own position, by his

dislike of having to fight his own son, or by his affection. Probably

the three sentiments combined to give to the course he adopted a

tinge of weakness. At any rate, he soon had reason to feel that his

concessions to his rebellious son had produced no good effect. For

Salim, whose memory was excellent, and whose hatred was insatiable,

took the opportunity of the return of Abulfazl from the Deccan, but

slightly attended, to instigate the Raja of Orchha to waylay and

murder him.[6]

[Footnote 6: Prince Salim justifies, in his _Memoirs_, the murder on

the ground that Abulfazl had been the chief instigator of Akbar in

his religious aberrations, as he regarded them. To the last he

treated the Raja of Orchha with the greatest consideration.]

The murder of his friend was a heavy blow to Akbar. Happily he never

knew the share his son had in that atrocious deed. Believing that the

Raja of Orchha was the sole culprit, he despatched a force against

him. The guilty Raja fled to the jungles, and succeeded in avoiding

capture, until the death of Akbar rendered unnecessary his attempts

to conceal himself. A reconciliation with Salim followed, and {140}

the Emperor once more despatched his eldest son to put down the

disturbances in Mewar. These disturbances, it may be mentioned, were

caused by the continued refusal of Rana Partap Singh to submit to the

Mughal. After his defeat at Huldighat in 1576, that prince had fled

to the jungles, closely followed by the imperial army. Fortune

continued so adverse to him that after a series of reverses,

unrelieved by one success, he resolved, with his family and trusting

friends, to abandon Mewar, and found another kingdom on the Indus. He

had already set out, when the unexampled devotion of his minister

placed in his hands the means of continuing the contest, and he

determined to try one more campaign. Turning upon his adversaries,

rendered careless by continued success, he smote them in the hinder

part, and, in 1586, had recovered all Mewar, the fortress of Chitor

and Mandalgarh excepted. Cut off from Chitor, he had established a

new capital at Udaipur, a place which subsequently gave its name to

his principality. When he died, in 1597, he was still holding his

own. He was succeeded by his son, Amra Rana, who, at the time at

which we have arrived, was bidding defiance, in Mewar, to all the

efforts of the imperial troops (1603).

Prince Salim had a great opportunity. The forces placed at his

disposal were considerable enough, if energetically employed, to

complete the conquest of Mewar, but he displayed so little taste for

the task that Akbar recalled him and sent him to his {141}

semi-independent government of Allahabad, where he spent his time in

congenial debauchery, and in worse. His disregard of all sense of

duty and honour, even of the lives of his most faithful attendants,

became at last so marked that Akbar set out for Allahabad, in the

hope that his presence might produce some effect. He had made but two

marches, however, when the news of the serious illness of his own

mother compelled him to return. But the fact that he had quitted Agra

for such a purpose produced a revulsion in the thought and actions of

Prince Salim. As his father could not come to him, he determined to

repair, slightly attended, to the court of his father. There he made

his submission, but he did not mend his ways, and his disputes with

his eldest son, Prince Khusru, became the scandal of the court.

The Emperor, indeed, was not happy in his children. His two eldest,

twins, had died in infancy. The third, erroneously styled the first,

was Prince Salim. The fate of the fourth son, Prince Murad, has been

told. The fifth son, Prince Danyal, described as tall, well-built,

good-looking, fond of horses and elephants, and clever in composing

Hindustani poems, was addicted to the same vice as his brother Murad,

and died about this time from the same cause. His death was a great

blow to Akbar, who had done all in his power to wean his son from his

excesses, and had even obtained a promise that he would renounce

them. There were at court many grandsons of the Emperor. Of these the

best-beloved was Prince Khurram, who {142} subsequently succeeded

Jahangir under the title of Shah Jahan.

The news of the death of Prince Danyal and its cause seem to have

greatly affected the Emperor. He was ill at the time, and it soon

became evident that his illness could have but one termination. The

minds of those about him turned at once to the consideration of the

succession. His only surviving son was Prince Salim, but his conduct

at Allahabad, at Agra, and elsewhere, had turned the hearts of the

majority against him, whilst in his son, Prince Khusru, the nobles

recognised a prince whose reputation was untarnished. Prince Khusru,

moreover, as the son of a princess of Jodhpur, was closely related to

Raja Man Singh, and that capable man was a great factor in the

empire. He had married, too, the daughter of the Muhammadan nobleman

who held the highest rank in the army, and who was himself probably

related to the royal family, for he was the son of the favourite

nurse of Akbar. These two great nobles began then to take measures

for the exclusion of Prince Salim, and the succession of Prince

Khusru.

To effect this purpose they had the fort of Agra, in the palace in

which Akbar was lying ill, guarded by their troops. Had Akbar died at

this moment his death must have given rise to a civil war, for Salim

would not renounce his pretensions. But, as soon as the prince

recognised the combination against him, alarmed for his personal

safety, he withdrew a short distance from Agra. Vexed at his absence

during {143} what he well knew was his last illness, Akbar, a lover

above all of legality, summoned his nobles around him, declared

Prince Salim to be his lawful successor, and expressed a hope that

Prince Khusru might be provided for by the government of Bengal.

The influence acquired by Akbar was never more apparent than at this

conjuncture. It needed but one expression of resentment against his

ungrateful and undutiful son to secure his exclusion. His expressions

in his favour, on the other hand, had the effect of inducing the most

powerful nobles to resolve to carry out his wishes, the half-hearted

and wavering to join with them. Not even the highest nobleman in the

army, the father-in-law of Prince Khusru, who had already combined

with Raja Man Singh to support Khusru, could resist the influence. He

sent privately to Prince Salim to assure him of his support. Man

Singh, the most influential of all at that particular crisis, seeing

that he was isolated, yielded to the overtures made him by Salim, and

promised also to uphold him. Secure now of the succession, Prince

Salim repaired to the palace, where he was affectionately received by

the dying Akbar. The circumstances of that interview are known only

from the report of the prince.

After the first affectionate greetings Akbar desired that all the

nobles might be summoned to the presence; 'for,' he added, 'I cannot

bear that any misunderstanding should subsist between you and those

who have for so many years shared in my toils, {144} and been the

companions of my glory.' When the nobles entered and had made their

salutations, he said a few words to them in a body; then, looking at

each of them in succession, he begged them to forgive him if he had

wronged any one of them. Prince Salim then threw himself at his feet,

weeping; but Akbar, signing to his attendants to gird his son with

his own scimitar and to invest him with the turban and robes of

State, commended to his care the ladies of the palace, urged him to

be kind and considerate to his old friends and associates, then,

bowing his head, he died.

Thus peacefully departed the real founder of the Mughal empire. More

fortunate than his father and his grandfather, more far-sighted, more

original, and, it must be added, possessing greater opportunities, he

had lived long enough to convince the diverse races of Hindustan that

their safety, their practical independence, their enjoyment of the

religion and the customs of their forefathers, depended upon their

recognition of the paramount authority which could secure to them

these inestimable blessings. To them he was a man above prejudices.

To all alike, whether Uzbek, or Afghan, or Hindu, or Parsi, or

Christian, he offered careers, provided only that they were faithful,

intelligent, true to themselves. The several races recognised that

during his reign of forty-nine years India was free from foreign

invasion; that he subjugated all adversaries within, some by force of

arms, some by means more peaceful, and that he preferred {145} the

latter method. 'The whole length and breadth of the land,' wrote

Muhammad Amin after his death, 'was firmly and righteously governed.

All people of every description and station came to his court, and

universal peace being established among all classes, men of every

sect dwelt secure under his protection.' Such was Akbar the ruler. In

the next chapter I shall endeavour to describe what he was as a man.

Akbar died the 15th October, 1605, one day after he had attained the

age of sixty-three.

{146}