CHAP. VII, Sore straits. Alarm at Agra. Sinister designs. sence at Kashmir. His subjects, who revered him, had always despised Shah Jehan. The old man was seventy-five years of age; she begged her father to let him spend his last days in peace. But Aurangzeb was not to be moved from his purpose. It was true that no one rebelled whilst he lay a helpless invalid at Delhi; but no one was certain that he, the Emperor, might not appear at any moment at the head of his army. Absence at Kashmir was a very different matter. Rebels would know that no news could reach Aurangzeb for weeks, and that more weeks must elapse before he could return to Delhi; during the interval he might lose the empire for ever. 39 Aurangzeb was case-hardened against remorse or shame. He had caused the death of three brothers, an eldest son, and a sister; but he wanted to justify the crime of parricide. Alarming news from Agra drove him to take action. The governor at Agra had insulted the imperial captive; in return Shah Jehan struck him in the face with a pair of slippers. The governor ordered the guards to arrest the prisoner; not a man stirred, not a man would lay his hands upon a sovereign who for years had been reverenced as a deity. The disaffection at Agra sealed the fate of Shah Jehan; but the first blow was averted. A cordial was sent to the physician of Shah Jehan; the physician was a Moghul who had long been in attendance on his imperial master. He was bound to that master by a loyal attachment which was not 39 The fate of this eldest son, Mahmud, was told in the previous chapter. Shah Alam was now the eldest son. uncommon in Moghul households. He knew that CHAP. VII. the cordial was poison, and drank it himself; he sank into a lethargy and died without pain. Jehan. Aurangzeb tried another tack. He sent presents Death of Shah and submissive letters to Shah Jehan. The old man was growing weak and foolish; he sent some jewels to Aurangzeb. In return, Aurangzeb sent him a European physician. The name of this European has not been preserved. He had been employed in more than one act of poisoning, and had been advanced to high dignity in the empire. The death of Shah Jehan was soon announced. How he perished is one of the many mysteries of the Moghul régime. suspicions. There are grave suspicions that Aurangzeb was Grave guilty of parricide. No one was ignorant of the fact that the death of Shah Jehan occurred at the right moment to allow Aurangzeb to start from Delhi at the appointed time. Various accounts were given of his death. One thing alone was certain; the death of Shah Jehan relieved Aurangzeb of the deep melancholy under which he had long been labouring. Fakhr-uNisá congratulated her father on the event. She feigned to know nothing of the guilt of the European physician. She ascribed the death of the old Emperor to the care of the Almighty for the safety of the empire. There was a magnificent funeral at Agra. Aurang- Funeral at Agra. zeb hurried to the city by water in order to conduct the remains of his father to the famous shrine of the Taj Mahal. The body was laid on a splendid car. The army marched before it arrayed in cotton, which was the sign of mourning in India. Aurangzeb followed the corpse in solemn sadness; his eyes were filled CHAP. VII. With tears; but what was passing in his heart was known only to a higher power.40 Ambitious dreams. European settlements. SECOND PERIOD: Aurangzeb at Kashmir, Delhi, and He At Kashmir Aurangzeb was another man. threw off all the languor, melancholy, and anxiety which oppressed him in the hot palace at Delhi. His predecessors had built a charming palace on the margin of the lake of Kashmír. In those cool retreats he gave himself up to pleasure in the society of his ladies. Soothed by their caresses and flatteries, he indulged in ambitious dreams of war and policy. He busied himself with Europeans; he thought to establish a maritime power which should cope with the ships that came from Europe. In imagination he saw himself the conqueror of China, the ally of Persia, the sovereign of all India as far as the southern ocean. Vision after vision faded away; but throughout the interval of rest and ease, the active brain of Aurangzeb was never still. In 1665 the Europeans had no territorial settlements in any part of the Moghul dominion. They had factories at Surat on the western coast, and at Hugli in Bengal; but all their territorial possessions were out 40 The death of Shah Jehan is accompanied with difficulties which defy the most patient and exhaustive research. Men knew it, but were afraid to speak about it. Bernier accompanied Aurangzeb to Kashmir in the full belief that Shah Jehan was alive at Agra, Khafi Khan says that Shah Jehan died in January 1666. Tavernier, who was in the Dekhan at the time, says that he heard of his death at the end of 1666. It will be seen hereafter that the Shah of Persia was suspicious of the crime very shortly after the death of Shah Jehan. side the Moghul empire. Bombay bordered on the CHAP. VII. Hindú kingdom of Sivaji, the Mahratta; Madras bordered on the Muhammadan kingdom of the Sultan of Golkonda; the Portuguese settlement at Goa, the largest European colony in India, bordered on the Muhammadan kingdom of the Sultan of Bíjápur. traders and In those days the regular European trade in the East Privileged was carried on by Portugal under the name of the king, interlopers. and by England and Holland under the name of their respective East India Companies. But there was a large irregular trade carried on by European adventurers on their private account, without any sanction of king or charter. They were called interlopers and pirates. Their hand was against every man, and every man's hand was against them. At Kashmir Aurangzeb heard that one of the im- European piracy. perial ships that carried pilgrims to Mecca had been captured by a European pirate. This was no uncommon disaster in the seventeenth century. No Asiatics can withstand Europeans on the high seas; and ships loaded with Muhammadan pilgrims and much treasure would be regarded as fair prize by so-called Christian pirates. Unfortunately some of the pilgrims were ladies belonging to the imperial seraglio; and it was reported that they had been rudely handled by their European captors. Aurangzeb was much exasperated at the insult. He Moghul marine, resolved to build a fleet for the suppression of piracy. His vizier warned him that he had no sailors, no pilots, no marines; that one ship manned with Europeans would rout twenty ships manned by Moghuls; that if he employed Europeans, they might slip away with ships and cargoes, and there would be no one to follow them. But Aurangzeb was bitten with a mania for CHAP. VII. Attempt and failure. Assam expedi tion. Chinese frontier. building ships on European principles. He resolved that his subjects should be taught and trained on the European system. An Italian jeweller, named Ortensio Bronzoni, succeeded in building two ships. They were ornamented after Moghul taste, manned with Europeans, and launched on the lake of Kashmír. On a certain day the two ships engaged in a mock combat before the palace windows. The Emperor looked on with all his ladies. He saw the ease and dexterity with which the ships were handled. He felt that no amount of teaching would impart the same quickness, nerve, and energy to his subjects. Accordingly he aban doned the design. By this time Aurangzeb's scheme for conquering China came to an untimely end. At first Amír Jumla encountered little difficulty in invading Assam. He was supported by a Portuguese flotilla on the Brahmaputra river. He captured the frontier fortress of Azo. He plundered the tombs of the Assam Rajas, and found much treasure.41 He then advanced twenty days' march through Assam to the Chinese frontier. There were some difficulties in passing over the mountains, but the valley beyond was an enchanting region. The climate was pleasant, and there was abundance of grain and fruit. The capital of Assam was named Ghergong. It was situated on a declivity near the Chinese frontier, and was enriched by the 42 41 The tombs of the Assam Rajas at Azo were subterranean vaults. The Rajas were not burnt after the Hindú fashion, but were buried with all their treasures, and also with their favourite wives and concubines, after the manner of the ancient Scythians. See Khafi Khan in Elliot's History, vol. vii.; also Tavernier's Indian Travels, Book iii., chap. 17. 42 The ruins of Ghergong were on the Dikho river, which falls into the Brahmaputra river from the south. In the present day the Dikho river is a very long distance from the Chinese frontier. |