CHAP. 3. obtained the crown it was cheaply purchased: if not, BOOK III still the benediction of a holy man was not without its use. Those Omrahs, who regarded their own pretensions to the throne as not inferior to those of Beloli, were disaffected. A party of them joined Mahmood, who held the usurped sovereignty of Bahar, and the country towards 'Orissa1; and was called king of Jonpoor, the city, at which he resided, on the banks of the Goomty, about forty miles from Benares. The victory which Beloli gained over their united forces established him firmly on his throne. Beloli made a progress through his unsettled provinces confirming or removing the several governors, as he supposed them affected to his interests. He was not long suffered to remain in peace. Between him and the rival sovereign of Jonpoor, or the East, an undecisive war was carried on during the whole of his reign. The advantage, partly through force, and partly through treachery, was, upon the whole, on the side of Beloli, who at last drove the king of the East from Jonpoor, and severed from his dominions the district to which it belonged. In his declining years Beloli divided the provinces of his empire among his sons, relations, and favourites; and died at an advanced age, in the thirty-ninth year of his reign. He was a modest sovereign; and when reproved by his friends for showing so little of the prince," It was enough for him," he replied, "that I Whence this is derived does not appear: it is not in Ferishta. The predecessor of Mahmood invaded Bengal but it was only a predatory incursion. The kings of the East never had possession of any part of Orissa -W. 1480. BOOK III the world knew he was king, without his making a CHAP. 3. vain parade of royalty." 1525. The partition which Beloli made of his dominions had no tendency to prevent those disputes about the succession which are so frequent in the east; but neither, perhaps, did it augment them. A strong party of the Omrahs declared for Sekunder, one of the younger sons of Beloli; and after some struggle of no great importance he was seated firmly on the throne. The usual measures were pursued for placing the provinces in a state of obedience and Sekunder was stimulated to endeavour the restoration of some of the districts which for several reigns had affected independence on the throne of Delhi. The tranquillity, however, of an empire, which had been so long distracted, was not easily preserved: and Sekunder was perpetually recalled from the frontiers of his kingdom, to anticipate or to quell insurrections within. He waged notwithstanding a successful war with the king of the East, who had been driven from Jonpoor by the father, and was now driven from Bahar by the son. But he found himself unequal to a war for the recovery of Bengal, to the confines of which he had once more extended the empire of Delhi; and that important province still remained in the hands of the usurper. Sekunder reigned, with the reputation of abilities, and of no inconsiderable virtue, for twenty-eight years and five months, and was succeeded by his son Ibrahim. Ibrahim had personal courage, and was not altogether destitute of talents: but he was a violent, capricious, unthinking prince; and quickly lost the affections and respect of his subjects. One of his СНАР. 3. 1525. maxims was, "that kings had no relations; for that BOOK III all men equally were the slaves of the monarch." This, though perfectly constitutional doctrine in the East, was a language which had now become unusual to the proud Omrahs of the falling throne of Delhi. Ibrahim was involved in an uninterrupted struggle with rebellion; against which, however, he maintained himself, during a space of twenty years. His empire was then invaded by Baber, a descendant of the great Timur, who in 1525 deprived him at once of his throne and his life. CHAPTER IV. From the Commencement to the Close of the Mogul UPON the death of Shahrokh, the son of Timur, and the division of the dominions of that conqueror among his descendants, quarrels and war ensued; the weakness and vice, which are the usual attendants upon long-inherited sovereignty, weakened the unsteady powers of Asiatic government; and in a few years the great empire of Timur was in a state of dissolution. The Turks, who had penetrated into western Asia, and who, under Bajazet, received a dreadful overthrow by the arms of Timur, no sooner felt the weakness of government in the hands of his successors, than they pressed upon the nearest provinces, СНАР. 4. BOOK III and at an early period were masters of Mesopotamia. Ismael was a disgraced servant of Jacob Beg, the 1525. eighth in the Turkish dynasty of the white sheep. Pursuing the career of a military adventurer, he collected around him a number of those daring characters, so numerous in the turbulent and unsettled countries of the East, whose business it is to seek a livelihood by their sword; and after a period, spent in subordinate plunder, he conceived himself sufficiently strong to attack, in the year 1500, the governor, or king (for he now affected independence) of the province of Shirvan. After the conquest of Shirvan, Ismael successively made himself master of Tauris, Media, Chaldea, Persia, and became the founder of the dynasty of the Sophis, who held the sceptre of Persia for a number of generations. On the eastern side of the Caspian, Shaïbek Khan, a chief of the Usbeks, or Tartars of Desht Kipchak, entered Transoxiana, at the head of his horde, in the year 1494. In the course of four years, he rendered himself master of all Transoxiana and Khorasan; the last of which was however wrested from the Usbecks, by the arms of Ismael Sophi, in the year 1510. Baber was the grandson of Abu Seid, the king of Zagatai; and Abu Seid was the son of Mohammed, the grandson of Timur, through Miran Shah. The dominions of Abu Seid were at his death divided among his sons. Ali became king of Kabul; Ahmed, king of Samarcand; Ahmer, king of Indijan and Fergana;' and Mahmood, king of Kunduz and Buduk 1 A more accurate nomenclature, as well as a more precise account, is to be found in the introduction to the Memoirs of Baber, lvii. Ahmed, was king of Samarkand; Mahmud, of Hisar, Kunduz and Badakhshan; shan. СНАР. 4. 1525 Baber was the son of Ahmer, king of Indijan BOOK III and Fergana; a district surrounded by mountains, lying between Samarkand and Kashgar. He succeeded his father, while yet very young, in the year 1493;1 and was immediately involved in a war with his uncles, desirous to profit by his youth and inexperience. Baber maintained himself against them with varying fortune, sometimes reduced to the lowest ebb, at other times borne on a flowing tide; till the arrival of Shaïbek, the Tartar. Shaïbek, after a struggle which was strenuously supported by Baber, swept the posterity of Timur from Transoxiana and Khorasan. Baber was compelled to retire towards Kabul; where the son of his uncle Ali had been dethroned by his Omrahs, and the greatest anarchy prevailed. The weak resistance opposed to Baber, in Kabul, he had means to overcome, and became master of that province in the year 1504. After spending some years in contending with the enemies who disputed with him the possession of Kabul, and resisted his efforts for obtaining Kandahar, he was fired with the hopes of recovering his paternal dominions, Ismael Sophi having defeated and slain his enemy, Shaïbek. In the year 1511 he marched towards Bokhara, of which, after some resistance, he made himself master. His next object was Samarkand, which surrendered upon his arrival. His ambition was to make this celebrated capital of the Ulugh Beg, of Kabul and Ghizni; and Omar Sheikh Mirza, father of It should be 1494. Mem. of Baber.-W. 2 By Ferishta, as translated by Dow, he is called Shaibani, ii. 100.—M. And in Baber's Memoirs, Shaibâk or Shaibani.—W. |