Treading disdainfully
Upon our very throats, he echoed back
Our clamorous shouts of triumph with defiance,
And laughed all threats and stratagems to scorn.
HINDOO DRAMA.
Chusero, and his brave companion in calamity, wandered all night
through the woods, uncertain as to the direction in which they were
proceeding. Towards morning they discovered a wretched hut, loosely
covered with dried branches and withered leaves. Permitting their horse
to take such food as he could find in such a spot, they laid themselves
down to rest, and slept until noon, when Afkun, awaking to the dreadful
recollection of the events of the preceding day, pressed both his hands
on his forehead, thought of his home, and asked himself with a sob
that almost rent his manly heart, “Ah! what now shall become of my
Nourmahal!”
No regrets passed through his mind for having joined the banner of
the prince in this war. He felt convinced, from all he had heard of
Jehangire, from the well-known habits of his life, from the follies
which he had committed, even when on his way to the Sutledge--follies,
which of course lost no shade of their original puerility, in the
rumours that wafted intelligence of them to all quarters of the
empire; but especially from the sallies of downright insanity to which
Jehangire was subject, that he was unfit to rule so important an empire
as Hindostan.
In summing up and justifying to himself his motives of action, the
husband of Nourmahal endeavoured to conceal the consciousness, that
he had also committed his destinies in the prince’s cause, from a
vague, yet always increasing apprehension, that there were strong,
perhaps indissoluble, though invisible links of affection between her
and Jehangire, which must, sooner or later, draw them too closely
together. And yet it was, perhaps, this feeling which, more than
any other, determined him, in the first moments of the civil war, to
choose the side he had taken. He knew not to what courses the reckless
and malignant Bochari might instigate the emperor, if he reached
the northern provinces, borne on the tide of victory. He feared the
passions of the sovereign, now no longer checked by the prohibitions of
Acbar, or awed by the authority of Fazeel.
Looking at the intelligent and chivalrous youth slumbering by his side,
covered with the gore and dust of battle, in which, though defeated,
he bore a part worthy of the valour of Baber, he felt more and more
attached to him. Placing his left hand on the prince’s shoulder, and
raising the other to the skies, he swore never to desert him; and even
if he could not promote him to the throne, for which he was so well
fitted by nature, at all events to acknowledge no other master, to the
last moment of his existence.
Afkun had awoke feverish and thirsty. He saw, by the flushed cheek and
brow, that his companion was equally so; and hearing, as he thought,
a gurgling sound at some distance, he went out to search for the
place whence it came. He soon lighted on a little brook, whose clear
waters were singing their way over a bed of pebbles and through fallen
leaves, little conscious of the tremendous scenes that had just been
enacted upon the banks of the river, to which haply they were about to
offer their slender tribute. Stooping down, he drank copiously of the
refreshing stream; then taking off his helmet, he filled it with the
transparent element, and laid it beside the prince, who, just opening
his eyes, looked around, wondering where he was. The affectionate
pressure of Afkun’s hand answered all his inquiries, and a draught of
the pure cold spring at once restored to his features their wonted
expression.
Chusero and his companion agreed that their only resource would be to
proceed at once to Lahore, which, being well fortified and powerfully
garrisoned, would enable them to hold out against the enemy, until
the late disasters could be in some measure repaired, and a new army
organized. With this view Afkun went in search of his horse, which was
nowhere to be seen. Venturing to call aloud to the animal, certain,
that if within the reach of his voice it would immediately answer
to his appeal, three or four men started at the sound from beneath
branches of trees, with which they had covered themselves. They turned
out to be soldiers of Cashmere, who had fled thither, like himself,
from the field of battle, and whose delight was inexpressible on
finding that their leader had also escaped unhurt from the perils of
the disastrous day. They immediately went in different directions
to look for their chieftain’s well-known steed, which they found at
some distance, feeding on the leaves of a tamarisk. The whole party
then proceeded through the forest, directing their course by the sun,
westward.
After emerging from the forest, they were joined, from time to time, by
other fugitives from the late scene of contest, who informed them that
the emperor’s army was already moving, with great rapidity, towards
Lahore. The unwelcome tidings also reached them, that Man-Singh,
notwithstanding his astonishing feat in cutting his way through the
ranks of the enemy, had been made prisoner, and ordered to be confined
in the fortress of Gwalior; and that Bochari, with three thousand
chosen men, had set out expressly in pursuit of the prince, whom he
had strict injunctions to convey, dead or alive, to the presence of the
emperor. Chusero resolved to sell his freedom only with his life, for
he knew that so long as Bochari controlled the councils of his father,
one would be just as valueless to him as the other.
Subsisting upon such wild berries and fruits, as the trees and shrubs
they found on their way, furnished; or, upon the provisions supplied
to them by the hospitable peasants, at whose huts they claimed the
assistance seldom denied in Hindostan to travellers; the prince and
his friend, attended by their followers, arrived in the course of a
few days on the banks of the Rawee, a deep and rapid river, which it
would be impossible for them to pass, unless at some of the ferries,
where boats were established at the expense of government. A boy whom
they met with, driving some swine, conducted them to the nearest ferry;
but although the passage was much frequented, no boats were to be
found. Afkun proceeded alone to the next village, where the ferryman
lived, and learned from him, that orders had been already received by
the zemindar of the district, from the imperial army, to stop all the
passages of the Rawee, and that, in compliance with those orders, the
boats had been secreted.
Upon returning to the prince, Afkun proposed to take measures for
compelling the ferryman to disclose the place where the boats were
concealed. “We have,” said he, “it is true, but a small force--in
all, I think, not exceeding a hundred men, but their quivers are
not wholly exhausted, their zeal may be relied upon, and we have no
time for deliberation.” It was then near midnight. Proceeding to the
village, they took the ferryman out of his bed, and threatened to tie
a large stone round his neck and throw him into the river, unless he
forthwith complied with their demand. He declared that the mandate of
the zemindar had been executed, not by him, but by the villagers, as
he happened to be at some distance fishing, when the orders arrived.
They then proceeded to seize the villagers, whose huts he pointed out.
Some were taken in their beds--others escaping, by their outcries
alarmed the country. The ferry-boats were nowhere to be found. Two of
his followers, whom Afkun had taken the precaution to send down the
river to see if, in any of the creeks, the boats had been concealed,
returned to him at day-break, with intelligence that two rafts, loaded
with wood, were tied to a tree at a distance below the village.
Hastening with the prince and his followers to the spot, they speedily
disencumbered the rafts of their burthen, and, crowding on board, began
to put across the stream. They had scarcely quitted the bank, when the
zemindar, being roused from sleep by the tumult, presented himself,
attended by his guards and a concourse of the people, and having in
vain ordered the rafts to be brought back, fired upon the navigators.
They returned the fire with their arrows, one of which transfixed the
zemindar, others wounded his guards and the people, who, irritated by
the circumstance, plunged into the river, and surrounding the rafts,
endeavoured to sink them. Some were pierced with arrows in the attempt,
others had their hands cut off. In the confusion the paddles were lost,
by which the rafts had hitherto been conducted. The fugitives were
therefore obliged to allow themselves to be borne down the current.
Chusero and Afkun immediately divested themselves of their armour,
with a view to swim to the farther bank, though the Rawee exhibited
a considerable expanse at that place, and appeared to widen at every
step. Meanwhile, a strong body of the imperial guards made their
appearance, led on by Bochari, who, perceiving his prey ready to
escape, jumped into the ferry-boat, which was just launched from
a neighbouring creek, where it had been hauled up, and with a few
followers, proceeded at once towards the raft, where he saw the prince
and Afkun ready to dive into the stream. Bochari, also, had left off
his armour, in consequence of the heat of the weather, and the rapidity
with which he was eager to travel. Afkun, observing the foe whom he
had in vain often attempted to discover in the field of battle, felt
new life rushing through his nerves, and entreating the prince to save
his life by hastening to the distant bank, lifted him on his steed,
and pushing the animal into the water, waited the approach of the
ferry-boat as the rock expects the coming wave, whose utmost fury it
disdains.
Both the warriors instinctively drew their scymitars at the same
moment, and as the boat, impelled by the oar and the current, passed
the raft, the two weapons met with a clash which flung a blaze of light
upon the water. The men on either side hung back, as if in the presence
of such chieftains they had no right to take a share in the conflict.
The impetuosity with which the boat was urged drove it against a sand
bank, where it adhered. The raft was in a few moments at its stern,
and Afkun, ordering his men to board the boat and sink her, if they
could, grappled with Bochari. The latter, feeling his arm held back
by somebody behind him, made an effort to extricate himself, and in
doing so, fell over the side of the vessel. Afkun seized him by the
shoulder, and pulling him on to the raft, gave him time to get erect
upon his legs. Again the two scymitars flashed against each other, each
of the combatants feeling, that in that moment, the fate of the empire
was in his hands, and that he had no means of safety except in his
own prowess. The advantage, at first, seemed in favour of Afkun, who,
scarcely allowing Bochari any time for parrying his blows, laid upon
him as if he were about to cleave him in two.
The Persian, however, gradually finding his footing on the raft, threw
up the weapon of the Turcoman by a dexterous understroke, and stooping,
wheeled round to the other side, where he placed himself in an attitude
of defence that drew forth applause even from the rival parties in
the boat, and suspended their contest. Both raft and boat were now
entangled in the sand-bank, the current driving them through it with a
force which they could not master.
Afkun again advanced upon his foe, who, holding his scymitar before
him, watched the coming blow with admirable coolness, and rendered it
ineffectual, without attempting to return it. He felt the power of
the gigantic arm against which he had hazarded his life, and looked
only to the resources of his ingenuity to exhaust that strength, or at
least to reduce it to his own level. But the Turcoman was not there
for the play of the gladiator, with which he was little conversant. He
repeated his onsets, until finding himself baffled by the vigilance of
his antagonist, he turned his scymitar in his hand, and striking that
of Bochari with the back of his weapon, sent more than the half of
it ringing into the stream. Then flinging his own blade after it, he
closed at once upon his dismayed opponent, grasping him in his arms
as the bear of Gundwana compresses the panther when they meet over
the same spoil, threatened to annihilate him, and would probably have
accomplished his purpose, if the raft, over-balanced by their united
weight, had not inclined to one side, when both fell headlong into the
foaming current.
The combatants disappeared; but in a few moments their heads were seen
above the water, at a short distance below the boat, struggling for
breath, Afkun still holding Bochari powerless in one of his muscular
arms, while with the other he endeavoured to stem the rapidity of
the tide. The contest was no longer equal. The cavalry on the banks
witnessed the danger in which their chief was involved, but afraid to
fire while the antagonists were thus closely linked together, they
procured another boat, and hastened to Bochari’s assistance. Afkun,
still stemming his way to the further bank, plunged repeatedly with
his burden in the depths of the river, and it was not until he saw the
second boat push forth from the shore, and quickly gaining upon him,
that diving once more, he returned to the surface alone.
The boatmen gave up Bochari as lost, when the soldiers in the vessel,
levelling their matchlocks at Afkun, sent forth a shower of balls that
ploughed the waters around him. But like the noble stag, even when hard
pressed by dogs and hunters in full pursuit, he held on his way in
stately pride, not looking once behind him, and urging his limbs with
unquailing energy through the flood, now that he could use them without
incumbrance, soon left the boat at a distance whence their fire was of
no avail, until touching the shelving bank, he strode it up like a god
emerging from his own dominion.
Bochari re-appeared a few moments after, and was taken into the boat,
in a condition so feeble that he was at first supposed to be lifeless.
But being conveyed to the shore with the least possible delay, he was
stripped of all his garments, and covered with hot sand, while the
soles of his feet were rubbed with heated oil. The flickering embers of
existence were thus gradually retained and strengthened, the glow came
back to his pallid cheek, and his arms were again seen beating the
air, as if he were still engaged in the deadly strife from which he had
just been rescued. From that moment he never heard the name of Afkun
repeated, without feeling his frame incased in the icy shroud of death.
The Turcoman’s first anxiety was to know what had become of the prince.
Nor was he long condemned to doubt upon that subject; while, having
ascended an eminence, he was still hesitating as to the direction
in which he should bend his steps, his beauteous steed, much soiled
with mud, came trotting towards him, neighing with delight for having
recovered its master. Looking along the bank whence the animal had
come, he perceived Chusero, and ran forward eagerly to meet him. The
prince related, that having escaped with no small difficulty from the
eddies of the Rawee, in which he was for some time involved, he lost
sight of the rafts altogether, but that, keeping his way, as soon as he
reached the land, along the river be heard the discharge of fire-arms.
He was at no loss to conjecture at whom they were directed, and
galloped on with all speed until, without suspecting it, he entered a
morass, where his horse sunk instantly to the saddle. He threw himself
off; the animal, with instinctive foresight of its peril, swaying on
its side, rolled over, and thus extricating its limbs, cautiously
retraced its steps, until it found a firm footing. At that moment
Afkun’s well-known figure presented itself upon the rising ground.
A brook, which formed one of the tributaries of the Rawee, enabled
them to cleanse the animal, who stood with joyous tranquillity in the
stream, while they applied the element to his limbs. Then mounting on
his back, and following the guidance of the river, they rode onward
night and day until they reached the gates of Lahore, which they found
closed, and vigilantly guarded, on account of the rumoured approach of
the imperial troops. The prince, on demanding admission, was at once
recognised by the sentinels, and entering the city, was every where
received with enthusiastic acclamations, notwithstanding his recent
disaster. The promises of fidelity made to him by the garrison and the
inhabitants, were renewed. They swore that they would defend the town
to the last; for besides the obligation they had already contracted
towards the prince, they apprehended from the mode in which the
emperor, at the instigation of Bochari, dealt with the prisoners who
had fallen into his hands, that they were to expect no mercy; that the
town, if unfortunately captured, would be given up to the pillage of
the imperial troops; that neither sex, nor age would be spared; and
that of the city itself not one stone would be permitted to remain upon
another.