The provinces which Baber received were those of Multan, Lahore, Dehli, Agra, Ajmere, and Oude. A very small part of Bahar belonged even nominally to the kingdom of Dehli, and the deserts of Ajmere contained few subjects, and those few it could scarcely support. Still the empire was a prize worth contending for; but it required the talents and the perseverance of Baber to establish even the shadow of regal authority, where anarchy had so long prevailed.

The family of Baber shall be the subject of another letter: not that I mean it to be so long as this; but I have been sometimes tempted to dwell a little longer than I intended on the reigns of some of the Patans, rather as a study of human nature in a state of society, where both the good and the bad appear in very high relief, than because these reigns had any permanent influence on the state of India. Where the system of government is so absolutely vicious, that its interior administration as well as external policy, is dependent on the arbitrary will of one man, whether weak and wicked, or of a firm and virtuous character, the effects of the longest and most beneficent reign, are quickly obliterated; and the wisest institutions and laws are subverted in a moment, by the passions of a weak, or the cruelties of a tyranni

cal prince. Thus the general tendency of such governments is to decay; and it is only when anarchy has risen to its height, and some vigorous genius who can be both a conqueror and a legislator, enforces a temporary calm, that man is allowed a little breathing time to recover strength for new exertions, and but too certainly for new sufferings. Such, in few words, has been the Mahommedan history of India. Of the institutions which made its native monarchies more respectable and more stable, we know too little; and of its present state, just recovering from the horrors of long and cruel wars, it is not fair to judge.

LETTER XII

THERE is no prince whose life can be better authenticated than that of Zeher o'dien Mahommed Baber Shah, for he has written his own memoirs in a style accounted elegant by those most conversant in eastern literature, and in a manner that shews him to have been a consummate general and an able politician at least towards the latter part of his life. He was the sixth in descent from the great Tamerlane, and was born A. H. 888*. At the early age of

A. D. 1472.

twelve years his father Selk Omar, king of Firghana and Indija, part of the inheritance of Timur, entrusted to him the government of Indija, depending entirely on his extraordinary abilities, and Omar being accidentally killed about the same time Baber, succeeded to the whole kingdom. His uncles, jealous of his abilities, and thinking that the dominions of a child would be easily seized, marched against him but were repulsed, as were various other princes who made the same attempts. When Baber had reached the age of fifteen, having saved his own dominions he thought of invading those of others, and accordingly marched against the king of Samarkand, and the same year took that capital, but gave great offence to his army by refusing to permit any plunder. This clemency was at that time so detrimental to his interests, that the greater part of his troops abandoned him, and while he was possessing himself of Samarkand, his own capital Indija was wrested from him. On his march to regain Indija the Samarkandians revolted, so that he found himself with a very small body of troops without a kingdom, and retreating from place to place without however losing courage or hope.

His fortune, which never remained long either wholly good or bad, restored to him at different times both Indija and Samarkand, but

his possession of either lasted but for a few months, so that at the age of twenty he found himself obliged to abandon his native country, and as the unsettled state of Cabul offered the fairest opening to his ambition, he marched thither, and two years afterwards established himself on the throne of that kingdom. This in all his future fortunes was the province most strongly attached to him, for he had won the hearts of the inhabitants by the patience and generosity with which he applied himself to relieve the miseries caused by a dreadful earthquake, which A. D. 1504 desolated that country.

I

It was in the year of the Hegira 925* that Baber first crossed the Indus, on the invitation of some of the nobles of Hindostan, who in the troubles of that unhappy time turned their eyes towards Baber for relief. But it was not until six years afterwards that he took possession of Lahore, and the next year marched to Dehli. Before he reached that capital Ibrahim met him with a large army, and a fierce engagement ensued, in which it is said that sixteen thousand Patans with Ibrahim himself were killed on the field. The Moguls immediately took possession of the capital, and the Kootbat was read in the

* A. D. 1517.

The Kootba is the solemn declaration of the lineage and

titles

He went

chief mosque in the name of Baber. after the ceremony to visit the tombs of the saints and heroes round the city, and thence to Agra, which quietly opened its gates to the new monarch, whose progress was marked by clemency and indulgence.

Thus Hindostan was

with a handful of men.

subdued by a stranger Ferishta says, " to what

then can we attribute this extraordinary conquest in a natural light but to the great abilities and experience of Baber, and the bravery of his few hardy troops, trained to war for their subsistence, and now fired with the hopes of glory and gain? But what contributed most to weigh down the scale of conquest was the degeneracy of the Patans, effeminated by luxury and wealth, and dead to all principles of virtue and honour, which their corrupt factions and civil discord had wholly effaced; it being now no shame to fly, no infamy to betray, no breach of honour to murder, and no scandal to change parties. When, therefore, the fear of shame and the love of fame were gone, it was no wonder that a herd without unanimity, order or discipline, should fall into the hands of a few brave men."

titles of a monarch, after which the royal umbrella is spread over their heads. The emperors of Dehli were never crowned, but on occasions of state the diadem was suspended over their heads from the state canopy.