CHAP. 2. 1285. known that the king was a man of pleasure, it became BOOK III immediately fashionable at court; and, in short, in a few days, luxury and vice so prevailed, that every shade was filled with ladies of pleasure, and every street rung with music and mirth. The king fitted up a palace at Kilogurry, upon the banks of the river Jumna; and retired thither to enjoy his pleasures undisturbed, admitting no company but singers, players, musicians, and buffoons." The father of Kei Kobad remained contented with his government of Bengal. But Nizam ud-din, who became the favourite minister of the young Shah, conceived hopes, from the negligence of his master, of paving for himself a way to the throne. He proceeded to remove the persons whose pretensions were likely to obstruct his career. The many acts of cruelty and perfidy, of which he was the cause, shed discredit upon the government. The father of Kei Kobad saw the danger; and forewarned his son. But the prince could not attend to business, without sacrificing pleasure. He found it, therefore, more agreeable to repose upon the minister, and neglected the advice. Kera, alarmed for his own fate, as well as that of his son, thought it advisable to second his advice with his presence, and his presence with an army. This was construed an act of hostility; and the Shah marched out from Delhi, at the head of an army, to oppose his father. The father, either conscious of his inferiority in point of strength, or unwilling to proceed to the last extremity, requested an interview. This was dreaded by the minister, who endeavoured to blow up the vanity and presumption of the young monarch to such a СНАР. 2. 1285. BOOK III pitch, that he might hear of nothing but a battle. Kera was not easy to be repulsed; and renewed his application by a letter full of parental expostulation and tenderness. The heart of the young prince was corrupted, but not yet thoroughly depraved. He could not resist the letter of his father; and Nizam ud-din, no longer able to defeat the interview by direct, endeavoured to elude it by artificial means. He prevailed upon the prince, as sovereign, to insist upon the first interview; in hopes that Kera would refuse. Kera was not a slave to points of ceremony; and readily consented to repair to the imperial camp; where the son was prepared to display his insolence at even his father's expense. The throne was set out with the greatest pomp and ceremony; and Kei Kobad ascending, commanded that his father should three times kiss the ground. At the first door, the aged prince was ordered to dismount; and, when he came in sight of the throne, to perform the abject obeisance of the East; the mace-bearer at the same time calling out, according to custom," The noble Kera to the king of the world sends health!" The father, whose heart was full, was no longer able to restrain his tears. Upon sight of his father in tears, the young prince forgot his insolence, and rushing from the throne, threw himself upon his face at his father's feet, and implored his forgiveness.' The presence and admonitions of Kera made an impression upon the mind of Kei Kobad, which it was too soft to retain. "When he arrived at Del 1 Mr. Stewart has greatly softened the account of the insolence of Kei Kobad. hi," says Ferishta, СНАР. 2. 1289. the advice of his father, for a BOOK III few days, seemed to take root in his mind. But his reformation was not the interest of the minister," He accordiugly plied him with pleasure in all the shapes in which it was known to have the greatest influence on his mind. The most beautiful and accomplished women whom it was possible to procure were made to present themselves to him at all the most accessible moments, and invention was exhausted to find an endless variety of modes to surprise and captivate the prince with new combinations of charms. The most exquisite musicians, dancers, players, buffoons, were collected to fill up the intervals left vacant by love. The hatred, however, which the snccess, the presumption, and insolence of the minister had engendered in his fellow-courtiers; or the suspicions aud fears which, at last, though tardily, were excited in the breast of the sovereign, cut short the days and the machinations of Nizam ud-din. He was taken off by poison. The authority of the king did not long survive. His intemperance in the haram brought on a palsy; which disabled him in one side, and distorted his countenance. All attention was then absorbed by the scramble for power. Every Omrah of popularity set up his pretensions. The friends of the royal family brought out the son of Kei Kobad, a child of three years old, and set him on the throne. He was supported by the Tartars; a body of whom, as mercenaries, were generally kept by the Indian sovereigns, whom they became the common instruments of setting up and pulling down. On the present occasion, the Tartars had BOOK III a formidable body of competitors. СНАР. 2. 1289. Of the Afghans, or mountaineers of Gaur and Ghirgistan, on the frontiers of Persia, a tribe named Chilligi1 made war and depredation their business; and usually, in great numbers, served, as mercenaries, any power which chose to employ them. An adventurer of this tribe, of the name of Mallek, who subsisted by his sword, rose to distinction in the army of Balin: and left his talent and his fortune to his son Feroze, who at the time of the illnes of Kei Kobad, was one of the chief Omrahs, and commanded a province. He was joined by the Chilligi mercenaries who attacked, and cut to pieces, the Tartars. There was no longer any obstruction. Kei Kobad was killed upon his bed, after a reign of little more than three years. Such was the termination of the Gaurian, or rather of the first Gaurian dynasty; and such the commencement of the Afghan, or second Gaurian dynasty, in the year 1289. At the time of this revolution, Kubla, the grandson of Jungiz, sat on the throne of Tartary and China; another of his descendants on that of Persia: and a third possessed a kingdom in Transoxiana, and those provinces to the north-west of the Indus which constituted the original dominions of the house of Ghizni. It is written Khuliji by Major Stewart.-M. Khilji, Briggs.-W. CHAPTER III. From the Commencement of the second Gaurian or Afghan Dynasty, to the Commencement of the Mogul Dynasty. BOOK III 1289. FEROZE was seventy years of age when he became CHAP. 3. the master of the kingdom. He was a man of intelligence; and though guilty of cruelty and injustice in acquiring or establishing his throne, he sought to distinguish himself by the justice, and also the popularity, of his administration. "For that purpose," says his historian, "he gave great encouragement to the learned of that age; who, in return, offered the incense of flattery at the altar of his fame." Chidju,' however, a prince of the royal blood, nephew of the late Balin, and a nabob or governor of a province, obtained the alliance of several chiefs, and marched with an army towards Delhi. Feroze placed himself at the head of his army, and sent forward his son with the Chilligi cavalry. The prince encountered the enemy, and obtaining an advantage, took several Omrahs prisoners, whom he mounted upon camels with branches hung round their necks. When Feroze beheld them in this state of humiliation, he ordered them to be unbound, gave a change of raiment to each, and set an entertainment before Jujhoo is the reading of this name by Briggs.-W. |