Rulers of India: Akbar Part 3

The news of his father's death, I have said, reached Akbar as he was entering the town of Kalanaur at the head of his army. At the moment he had not heard of the revolt at Kabul, nor had his adviser, Bairam Khan, dwelt in his mind on the probability of a movement by Hemu against Delhi. In the first few days, then, it seemed as though there were but one enemy in the field, and that enemy the Sikandar Shah, to suppress whom his father had sent him to the Punjab. That prince was still in arms, slowly retreating in the direction of Kashmir. It appeared, then, to the young Emperor and his adviser that their first business should be to secure the Punjab; that to effect that object they must follow up Sikandar Shah. The army accordingly broke up from Kalanaur, pushed after Sikandar, and drove him to take refuge in the fort of Mankot, in the lower ranges of the Siwaliks. As Mankot was very strong, and tidings of untoward events alike in Hindustan and Kabul reached them, the leaders {66} contented themselves with leaving a force to blockade that fortress, and returned to Jalandhar.

It was time indeed. Not only had Kabul revolted, but Hemu, his army increasing with every step, had taken Agra without striking a blow, and was pursuing the retreating garrison towards Delhi. A day later came the information that he had defeated the Mughal army close to Delhi, and had occupied that capital. Tardi Beg, with the remnants of the defeated force, had fled towards Sirhind.

In the mult.i.tude of counsellors there is not always wisdom. When Akbar heard of the success of Hemu, he a.s.sembled his warrior-n.o.bles and asked their advice. With one exception they all urged him to fall back on Kabul. That he could recover his mountain-capital they felt certain, and there he could remain until events should be propitious for a fresh invasion of India. Against this recommendation Bairam Khan raised his powerful voice. He urged a prompt march across the Sutlej, a junction with Tardi Beg in Sirhind, and an immediate attempt thence against Hemu. Delhi, he said, twice gained and twice lost, must at all hazards be won back. Delhi was the decisive point, not Kabul. Master of the former, one could easily recover the latter.

The instincts of Akbar coincided with the advice of his Atalik, and an immediate march across the Sutlej was directed.

Akbar and Bairam saw in fact that their choice lay between empire in Hindustan and a small kingdom in Kabul. For they knew from their adherents in {67} India that Hemu was preparing to supplement the occupation of Delhi by the conquest of the Punjab. To be beforehand with him, to transfer the initiative to themselves, always a great matter with Asiatics, was almost a necessity to secure success. Akbar marched then from Jalandhar in October, and crossing the Sutlej, gained the town of Sirhind. There he was joined by Tardi Beg and the n.o.bles who had been defeated by Hemu under the walls of Delhi. The circ.u.mstances which followed their arrival sowed in the heart of Akbar the first seeds of revolt against the licence of power a.s.sumed by his Atalik. Tardi Beg was a Turki n.o.bleman, who, in the contest between Humayun and his brothers, had more than once shifted his allegiance, but he had finally enrolled himself as a partisan of the father of Akbar. When Humayun died, it was Tardi Beg who by his tact and loyalty succeeded in arranging for the bloodless succession of Akbar, though a son of Kamran was in Delhi at the time. After his defeat by Hemu, he had, it is true, in the opinion of some of the other n.o.bles, too hastily evacuated Delhi; but an error in tactics is not a crime, and he had at least brought a powerful reinforcement to Akbar in Sirhind. But there had ever been jealousy between Bairam Khan and Tardi Beg. This jealousy was increased in the heart of Bairam by religious differences, for Bairam belonged to the Shi'ah division of the Muhammadan creed, and Tardi Beg was a Sunni. On the arrival of the latter at Sirhind, then, Bairam summoned him to his tent {68} and had him a.s.sa.s.sinated.[1] Akbar was greatly displeased at this act of violence, and Bairam did not succeed in justifying himself. It may be inferred that he excused himself on the ground that such an act was necessary, in the interests of discipline, to secure the proper subordination of the n.o.bles.

[Footnote 1: Vide Dowson's Sir Henry Elliot's _History of India as told by its own Historians_, vol. v. page 251 and note. The only historian who states that Akbar gave a 'kind of permission' to this atrocious deed is Badauni. He is practically contradicted by Abulfazl and Ferishta. In Blochmann's admirable edition of the _Ain-i-Akbari_, p. 315, the story is repeated as told by Badauni, but the translator adds the words: 'Akbar was displeased. Bairam's hasty act was one of the chief causes of the distrust with which the Chagatai n.o.bles looked upon him.']

Meanwhile Hemu remained at Delhi, amusing himself with the new t.i.tle of Raja which he had a.s.sumed, and engaged in collecting troops. When, however, he heard that Akbar had reached Sirhind, he despatched his artillery to Panipat, fifty-three miles to the north of Delhi, intending to follow himself with the infantry and cavalry. But, on his side, Akbar was moving from Sirhind towards the same place. More than that, he had taken the precaution to despatch in advance a force of ten thousand hors.e.m.e.n, under the command of ali Kuli Khan-i-Shaibani, the general who had fought with Tardi Beg against Hemu at Delhi, and who had condemned his too hasty retirement.[2] ali Kuli rode as far as Panipat, and noting there the guns of Hemu's army, unsupported, he dashed upon them and captured them all. {69} For this brilliant feat of arms he was created a Khan Zaman, by which he is henceforth known in history. This misfortune greatly depressed Hemu, for, it is recorded, the guns had been obtained from Turkey, and were regarded with great reverence. However, without further delay, he pressed on to Panipat.

[Footnote 2: Blochmann's _Ain-i-Akbari_, p. 319.]

Akbar and Bairam were marching on to the plains of Panipat on the morning of the 5th of November, 1556, when they sighted the army of Hemu moving towards them. The thought must, I should think, have been present in the mind of the young prince that just thirty years before his grandfather, Babar, had, on the same plain, struck down the house of Lodi, and won the empire of Hindustan. He was confronted now by the army of the usurper, connected by marriage with that House of Sur which had expelled his own father. The battle, he knew, would be the decisive battle of the century. But, prescient as he was, he could not foresee that it would prove the starting-point for the establishment in India of a dynasty which would last for more than two hundred years, and would then require another invasion from the north, and another battle of Panipat to strike it down; the advent of another race of foreigners from an island in the Atlantic to efface it.

Hemu had divided his army into three divisions. In front marched the five hundred elephants, each bestridden by an officer of rank, and led by Hemu, on his own favourite animal, in person. He dashed first against the advancing left wing of the Mughals and {70} threw it into disorder, but as his lieutenants failed to support the attack with infantry, he drew off, and threw himself on the centre, commanded by Bairam in person. That astute general had directed his archers, in antic.i.p.ation of such an attack, to direct their arrows at the faces of the riders. One of these arrows pierced the eye of Hemu, who fell back in his howdah, for the moment insensible. The fall of their leader spread consternation among the followers. The attack slackened, then ceased. The soldiers of Bairam soon converted the cessation into a rout. The elephant on which Hemu rode, without a driver--for the driver had been killed[3]--made off instinctively towards the jungle. A n.o.bleman, a follower and distant relative of Bairam, Shah Kuli Mahram-i-Baharlu, followed the elephant, not knowing who it was who rode it. Coming up with it and catching hold of the rope on its neck, he discovered that it was the wounded Hemu who had become his captive.[4] He led him to Bairam. Bairam took him to the youthful prince, who throughout the day had shown courage and conduct, but who had left the ordering of the battle to his Atalik.

The scene that followed is thus told by contemporary writers. Bairam said to his master, as he presented to him the wounded general: 'This is your first war: prove your sword on this infidel, for it will be a meritorious deed.' {71} Akbar replied: 'He is now no better than a dead man; how can I strike him? If he had sense and strength I would try my sword (that is I would fight him).' On Akbar's refusal, Bairam himself cut down the prisoner.

[Footnote 3: This is the generally received story, though Abulfazl states that the driver, to save his own life, betrayed his master.

Elliot, vol. v. p. 253, note.]

[Footnote 4: Compare Elliot, vol. v. p. 253, and Blochmann's _Ain-i-Akbari_, p. 359.]

Bairam sent his cavalry to pursue the enemy to Delhi, giving them no respite, and the next day, marching the fifty-three miles without a halt, the Mughal army entered the city. Thenceforward Akbar was without a formidable rival in India. He occupied the position his grandfather had occupied thirty years before. It remained to be seen whether the boy would use the opportunity which his father and grandfather had alike failed to grasp. To show the exact nature of the task awaiting him, I propose to devote the next chapter to a brief survey of the condition of India at the time of his accession, and in that following to inquire how the boy of fourteen was likely to benefit by the tutelage of Bairam Khan.

{72}

CHAPTER IX GENERAL CONDITION OF INDIA IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

The empire conquered south of the Sutlej by the Afghan predecessors of the Mughal had no claim to be regarded as the empire of Hindustan.

It was rather the empire of Delhi, that is, of the provinces called up to the year 1857 the North-western Provinces, including that part of the Bengal Presidency which we know as Western Behar, and some districts in the Central Provinces and Rajputana. It included, likewise, the Punjab. For a moment, indeed, the princes of the House of Tughlak could claim supremacy over Bengal and almost the whole of Southern India, but the first invasion from the north gave the opportunity which the Hindu princes of the south seized to shake off the uncongenial yoke, and it had not been re-imposed. The important kingdom of Orissa, extending from the mouth of the Ganges to that of the G.o.davari, had always maintained its independence. Western India, too, had for some time ceased to acknowledge the sway of the foreign invader, and its several states had become kingdoms.

{73} Thus, at the accession of Akbar, the westernmost portion of India, the kingdom of Gujarat, ruled over by a Muhammadan prince of Afghan blood, was independent. It had been overrun, indeed, by Humayun, but on his flight from India it had re-a.s.serted itself, and had not since been molested. Indeed it had carried on a not unsuccessful war with its nearest neighbour, Malwa. That state, embracing the greater part of what we know as Central India, was thus independent at the accession of Akbar. So likewise was Khandesh: so also were the states of Rajputana. These latter deserve a more detailed notice.

The exploits of the great Sanga Rana have been incidentally referred to in the first chapter. The defeat of that prince by Babar had greatly affected the power of Mewar, and when Sher Shah drove Humayun from India its chiefs had been compelled eventually to acknowledge the overlordship of the conqueror. But, during the disturbances which followed the death of Sher Shah, they had recovered their independence, and at the accession of Akbar they still held their high place among the states of Rajputana. Of the other states it may briefly be stated that the rulers of Jaipur had paid homage to the Mughal in the time of Babar. The then Raja, Baharma, had a.s.sisted that prince with his forces, and had received from Humayun, prior to his defeat by Sher Shah, a high imperial t.i.tle as ruler of ambar. The son of Baharma, Bhagwan Das, occupied the throne when Akbar won {74} Panipat. Jodhpur, in those days, occupied a far higher position than did Jaipur. Its Raja, Maldeo Singh, had given to the great Sher Shah more trouble in the field than had any of his opponents. He had, however, refused an asylum to Humayun when Humayun was a fugitive. He was alive, independent, and the most powerful of all the princes of Rajputana when Akbar ascended the throne of Delhi. Jaisalmer, Bikaner, and the states on the borders of the desert were also independent. So likewise were the minor states of Rajputana; so also was Sind; so also Multan. Mewat and Baghelkhand owned no foreign master; but Gwalior, Orchha, Chanderi, Narwar, and Pannao suffered from their vicinity to Agra, and were more or less tributary, according to the leisure accruing to the conqueror to a.s.sert his authority.

But even in the provinces which owned the rule of the Muhammadan conqueror there was no cohesion. The king, sultan, or emperor, as he was variously called, was simply the lord of the n.o.bles to whom the several provinces had been a.s.signed. In his own court he ruled absolutely. He commanded the army in the field. But with the internal administration of the provinces he did not interfere. Each of these provinces was really, though not nominally, independent under its own viceroy.

According to all concurrent testimony the condition of the Hindu population, who const.i.tuted seven-eighths of the entire population of the provinces subject to Muhammadan rule, was one of contentment.

They {75} were allowed the free exercise of their religion, though they were liable to the _jizyia_ or capitation tax, imposed by Muhammadans on subject races of other faiths. But in all the departments of the Government the Hindu element was very strong. In most provinces the higher cla.s.ses of this faith maintained a hereditary jurisdiction subordinate to the governor; and in time of war they supplied their quota of troops for service in the field.

Each province had thus a local army, ready to be placed at the disposal of the governor whenever he should deem it necessary. But, besides, and unconnected with this local army, he had almost always in the province a certain number of imperial troops, that is, of troops paid by the Sultan, and the command of which was vested in an officer nominated by the Sultan. This officer was, to a great extent, independent of the local governor, being directly responsible to the sovereign.

Theoretically, the administration of justice was perfect, for it was dispensed according to the Muhammadan principle that the state was dependent on the law. That law was administered by the Kazis or judges in conformity with a code which was the result of acc.u.mulated decisions based on the Kuran, but modified by the customs of the country. The Kazi decided all matters of a civil character; all questions, in fact, which did not affect the safety of the state. But criminal cases were reserved to the jurisdiction of a body of men whose mode of procedure {76} was practically undefined, and who, nominated and supported by the Crown, sometimes trenched on the authority of the Kazi. The general contentment of the people would seem, however, to authorise the conclusion that, on the whole, the administration of justice was performed in a satisfactory manner.

Time had welded together the interests of the families of the earlier Muhammadan immigrant and those of the Hindu inhabitant, and they both looked alike to the law to afford them such protection as was possible. In spite of the many wars, the general condition of the country was undoubtedly, if the native records may be trusted, very flourishing.

It is important to note, in considering the administration upon which we are now entering, that neither Babar nor Humayun had changed, to any material extent, the system of their Afghan predecessors in India. Babar, indeed, had been accustomed to a system even more autocratic. Whether in Ferghana, in Samarkand, or in Kabul, he had not only been the supreme lord in the capital, but also the feudal lord of the governors of provinces appointed by himself. Those governors, those chiefs of districts or of jaghirs, did indeed exercise an authority almost absolute within their respective domains. But they were always removable at the pleasure of the sovereign, and it became an object with them to administer on a plan which would secure substantial justice, or to maintain at the court agents who should watch over their interests with the ruling prince.

{77} Similarly the army was composed of the personal retainers of the sovereign, swollen by the personal retainers of his chiefs and va.s.sals and by the native tribes of the provinces occupied.

With Babar, too, as with his son, the form of government had been a pure despotism. Free inst.i.tutions were unknown. The laws pa.s.sed by one sovereign might be annulled by his successor. The personal element, in fact, predominated everywhere. The only possible check on the will of the sovereign lay in successful rebellion. But if the sovereign were capable, successful rebellion was almost an impossibility. If he were just as well as capable, he discerned that the enforcement of justice const.i.tuted his surest safeguard against any rebellion.

Babar, then, had found in the provinces of India which he had conquered a system prevailing not at all dissimilar in principle to that to which he had been accustomed in the more northern regions.

Had he been disposed to change it, he had not the time. Nor had his successor either the time or the inclination. The system he had pondered over just prior to his death shows no radical advance in principle on that which had existed in Hindustan. He would have parcelled out the empire into six great divisions, of which Delhi, Agra, Kanauj, Jaunpur, Mandu, and Lah.o.r.e should be the centres or capitals. Each of these would have been likewise great military commands, under a trusted general, whose army-corps should be so strong as to render him independent of {78} outside aid: whilst the Emperor should give unity to the whole by visiting each division in turn with an army of twelve thousand horse, inspecting the local forces and examining the general condition of the province. The project was full of defects. It would have been a bad mode of administration even had the sovereign been always more capable than his generals. It could not have lasted a year had he been less so.

The sudden death of Humayun came to interfere with, to prevent the execution of, this plan. Then followed the military events culminating in the triumph of Panipat. That battle placed the young Akbar in a position his grandfather Babar had occupied exactly thirty years before. Then, it had given Babar the opportunity, of which he availed himself, to conquer North-western India, Behar, and part of Central India. A similar opportunity was given by the second battle of Panipat to Akbar. On that field he had conquered the only enemy capable of coping with him seriously. As far as conquest then was concerned, his task was easy. But to make that conquest enduring, to consolidate the different provinces and the diverse nationalities, to devise and introduce a system so centralising as to make the influence of the Emperor permeate through every town and every province, and yet not sufficiently centralising to kill local traditions, local customs, local habits of thought,--that was a task his grandfather had never attempted; which, to his father, would have seemed an impossibility, even if it had occurred or {79} had been presented to him. Yet, in their schemes, the absence of such a programme had left the empire conquered on the morrow of the Panipat of 1526, an empire without root in the soil, dependent absolutely on continued military success; liable to be overthrown by the first strong gust; not one whit more stable than the empires of the Ghaznivides, the Ghors, the Khiljis, the Tughlaks, the Saiyids, the Lodis, which had preceded it. That it was not more stable was proved by the ease with which the empire founded by Babar succ.u.mbed, in the succeeding reign, to the attacks of Sher Shah. It may be admitted that if Babar had been immortal he might possibly have beaten back Sher Shah. But that admission serves to prove my argument. Babar was a very able general. So likewise was Sher Khan. Humayun was flighty, versatile, and unpractical; as a general of but small account. It is possible that the Sher Khan who triumphed over Humayun might have been beaten by Babar. But that only proves that the system introduced by Babar was the system to which he had been accustomed all his life--the system which had alternately lost and won for him Ferghana and Samarkand; which had given him Kabul, and, a few years later, India; the system of the rule of the strongest. Nowhere, neither in Ferghana, nor in Samarkand, nor in Kabul, nor in the Punjab, nor in India, had it shot down any roots. It was in fact impossible it could do so, for it possessed no germinating power.

{80} And now, at the close of 1556, the empire won and lost and won again was in the hands of a boy, reared in the school of adversity and trial, one month over fourteen years.[1] Panipat had given him India. Young as he was, he had seen much of affairs. He had been constantly consulted by his father: he had undergone a practical military education under Bairam, the first commander of the day: he had governed the Punjab for over six months. But it was as an administrator as well as a conqueror that he was now about to be tried. In that respect neither the example of his father, nor the precepts of Bairam, could influence him for good. So far as can be known, he had already displayed the germs of a judgment prompt to meet difficulties, a disposition inclined to mercy. He had refused to slay Hemu. But other qualities were required for the task now opening before him. Let us examine by the light of subsequent transactions what were his qualifications for the task.

[Footnote 1: Akbar was born the 15th October, 1542. The second battle of Panipat was fought the 5th November, 1556.]

{81}

CHAPTER X THE TUTELAGE UNDER BAIRaM KHaN

First, as to his outward appearance. 'Akbar,' wrote his son, the Emperor Jahangir,[1] 'was of middling stature, but with a tendency to be tall; he had a wheat-colour complexion, rather inclining to be dark than fair, black eyes and eyebrows, stout body, open forehead and chest, long arms and hands. There was a fleshy wart, about the size of a small pea, on the left side of his nose, which appeared exceedingly beautiful, and which was considered very auspicious by physiognomists, who said that it was a sign of immense riches and increasing prosperity. He had a very loud voice, and a very elegant and pleasant way of speech. His manners and habits were quite different from those of other persons, and his visage was full of G.o.dly dignity.' Other accounts confirm, in its essentials, this description. Elphinstone writes of him as 'a strongly built and handsome man, with an agreeable expression of countenance, and very captivating manners,' and as having been endowed with great personal strength. He was capable of enduring great fatigue; was fond of riding, of walking, of shooting, of {82} hunting, and of all exercises requiring strength and skill. His courage was that calm, cool courage which is never thrown off its balance, but rather shines with its greatest l.u.s.tre under difficulty and danger. Though ready to carry on war, especially for objects which he deemed essential to the welfare of the empire or for the common weal, he did not rejoice in it. Indeed, he infinitely preferred applying himself to the development of those administrative measures which he regarded as the true foundation of his authority. War, then, to him was nothing more than a necessary evil. We shall find throughout his career that he did not wage a single war which he did not consider to be necessary to the completion and safety of his civil system. He had an affectionate disposition, was true to his friends, very capable of inspiring affection in others, disliked bloodshed, was always anxious to temper justice with mercy, preferred forgiveness to revenge, though, if the necessities of the case required it, he could be stern and could steel his heart against its generous promptings. Like all large-hearted men he was fond of contributing to the pleasures of others. Generosity was thus a part of his nature, and, even when the recipient of his bounties proved unworthy, he was more anxious to reform him than regretful of his liberality. For civil administration he had a natural inclination, much preferring the planning of a system which might render the edifice his arms were erecting suitable to the yearnings of the people to the planning of a {83} campaign. On all the questions which have affected mankind in all ages, and which affect them still, the questions of religion, of civil polity, of the administration of justice, he had an open mind, absolutely free from prejudice, eager to receive impressions. Born and bred a Muhammadan, he nevertheless consorted freely and on equal terms with the followers of Buddha, of Brahma, of Zoroaster, and of Jesus. It has been charged against him that in his later years he disliked learned men, and even drove them from his court. It would be more correct to say that he disliked the prejudice, the superst.i.tion, and the obstinate adherence to the beliefs in which they had been educated, of the professors who frequented his court. He disliked, that is, the weaknesses and the foibles of the learned, and when these were carried to excess, he dispensed with their attendance at his court.

What he was in other respects will be discovered by the reader for himself in the last chapter of this book. Sufficient, I hope, has been stated to give him some idea of the characteristics of the latent capacity of the young prince, who, fourteen years old, had under the tutelage of Bairam Khan won the battle of Panipat, and had marched from the field directly, without a halt, upon Delhi. Few, if any, of those about him knew then the strength of his character or the resources of his intellect. Certainly, his Atalik, Bairam, did not understand him, or he would neither have a.s.sa.s.sinated Tardi Beg in his tent at Sirhind, nor have suggested to the young prince to {84} plunge his sword into the body of the captured Hemu. But both Bairam and the other n.o.bles of the court and army were not long kept in ignorance of the fact that in the son of Humayun they had, not a boy who might be managed, but a master who would be obeyed.

[Footnote 1: Sir Henry Elliot's _History of India, as told by its own Historians_, vol. vi. p. 290.]

Akbar remained one month at Delhi. He sent thence a force into Mewat to pursue the broken army of Hemu and to gain the large amount of treasure it was conveying. In this short campaign his general, Pir Muhammad Khan of Sherwan, at the time a follower of Bairam but afterwards persecuted by him,[2] was eminently successful. Akbar then marched upon and recovered Agra.

[Footnote 2: _Ain-i-Akbari_ (Blochmann's Edition), pp. 324-5.]

But his conquests south of the Sutlej were not safe so long as the Punjab was not secure. And, as we have seen, he had been forced to leave at Mankot, driven back but not overcome, a determined enemy of his House in the person of Sikandar Sur. In March of the following year (1557) he received information that the advanced guard of the troops he had left in the Punjab had been defeated by that prince some forty miles from Lah.o.r.e. n.o.blemen who came from the Punjab told him that the business was very serious, as Sikandar had made sure of a very strong base at Mankot, whence he might emerge to annoy even though he were defeated in the field, and that his victory had encouraged his partisans. Akbar recognised all the force of the argument, and resolved to put in force a maxim which const.i.tuted the great {85} strength of his reign, that if a thing were to be done at all, it should be done thoroughly. He accordingly marched straight on Lah.o.r.e, and, finding Lah.o.r.e safe, from that capital into Jalandhar, where his enemy was maintaining his ground. On the approach of Akbar, Sikandar retreated towards the Siwaliks, and threw himself into Mankot. There Akbar besieged him.

The siege lasted six months. Then, pressed by famine and weakened by desertions, Sikandar sent some of his n.o.bles to ask for terms. Akbar acceded to his request that his enemy might be allowed to retire to Bengal, leaving his son as a hostage that he would not again war against the Emperor. The fort then surrendered, and Akbar returned to Lah.o.r.e; spent four months and fourteen days there to arrange the province, and then marched on Delhi. As he halted at Jalandhar, there took place the marriage of Bairam Khan with a cousin of the late emperor, Humayun. This marriage had been arranged by Humayun, and to the young prince his father's wishes on such subjects were a law.

Akbar reentered Delhi on the 15th of March, 1558. Bairam Khan was still, in actual management of affairs, the Atalik, the tutor, of the sovereign, and he continued to be so during the two years that followed, 1558 and 1559. It is not easy for a young boy to shake off all at once the influence of a great general under whom he had been placed to learn his trade, and possibly Akbar, though he did not approve many of the acts {86} authorised in his name by his Atalik, did not feel himself strong enough to throw off the yoke. But the removal by the strong hand of men whom Akbar liked, but who had incurred without reason the enmity of Bairam, gradually estranged the heart of the sovereign from his too autocratic minister. The estrangement, once begun, rapidly increased. Bairam did not recognise the fact that every year was developing the strong points in the character of his master; that he was adding experience and knowledge of affairs to the great natural gifts with which he had been endowed.

He still continued to see in him the boy of whom he had been the tutor, whose armies he had led to victory, and whose dominions he was administering. The exercise of power without a check had made the exercise of such power necessary to him, and he continued to wield it with all the self-sufficiency of a singularly determined nature.

Round every young ruler there will be men who will never fail to regard the exercise by another of authority rightly pertaining to him as a grievous wrong to the ruler and to themselves. It is not necessary to inquire into the motives of such men. For one reason or another, often doubtless of a selfish, rarely of a pure and disinterested nature, they desire the young and rightful master of the State to be the dispenser of power and patronage. That there was a cl.u.s.ter of such men about Akbar, of men who disliked Bairam, who had been injured by him, who expected from the prince favours which they could not hope to {87} obtain from the minister, is certain.

Female influence was also brought to bear on the mind of the sovereign. His nurse, who had attended on him from his cradle until after his accession, and who subsequently became the chief of his harem, urged upon him that the time had arrived when he should take the administration into his own hands. Akbar was not unwilling. He was in his eighteenth year. The four years he had lived since Panipat had restored to him part of the inheritance of his father, had been utilised by him in a manner calculated to develop and strengthen his natural qualities. But, though he saw and disliked the tendency to cruelty and arbitrary conduct often displayed by his chief minister, he had that regard for Bairam which a generous heart instinctively feels for the man who has been his tutor from his childhood.

Experience, too, had given him so thorough an insight into the character of Bairam that he could not but be sensible that any breach with him must be a complete breach; that he must rid himself of him in a manner which would render it impossible for him to aspire to the exercise of any power whatever. Bairam, he knew, would have the whole authority, or it would be unsafe to entrust him with any.

Various circ.u.mstances occurred in the beginning of 1560 which determined Akbar to take into his own hands the reins of government.

He went therefore from Agra to Delhi resolved to announce this determination to his minister. Bairam himself had more than {88} once given an example of the mode in which he rid himself of a rival or a n.o.ble whom he hated. His methods were the dagger or the sword. But such a remedy was abhorrent to the pure mind of the young Emperor.

Nor--so far as can be gathered from the records of the period--had anyone dared to whisper to him a proposal of that character. The course which his mother and his nurse had alike suggested was to propose to the minister in a manner which would make the proposition have all the effect of a command, an honourable exile to Mekka.

Bairam had often publicly declared that he was longing for the opportunity when he could safely resign his political burden into the hands of others and make the pilgrimage which would ensure salvation.

Akbar then, anxious to prevent any armed resistance, on arriving at Delhi, issued a proclamation in which he declared that he had a.s.sumed the administration of affairs, and forbade obedience to any orders but to those issued by himself. He sent a message to this effect to his minister, and suggested in it the desirability of his making a pilgrimage to Mekka.[3] Bairam had heard of Akbar's determination before the message reached him, and had quitted Agra on his way {89} to the western coast. He was evidently very angry, and bent on mischief, for, on reaching Biana, he set free some turbulent n.o.bles who had been there confined. He received there Akbar's message, and continued thence his journey to Nagaur in Rajputana, accompanied only by n.o.bles who were related to him, and by their respective escorts.

From Nagaur, by the hand of one of these, he despatched to the Emperor, as a token of submission to his will, his banner, his kettle-drums, and all other marks of n.o.bility. Akbar, who had been a.s.sured that Bairam would most certainly attempt to rouse the Punjab against him, had marched with an army towards that province, and was at Jhajhar, in the Rohtak district, when the insignia reached him. He conferred them upon a former adherent of Bairam's, but who in more recent times had lived under the displeasure of that n.o.bleman, and commissioned him to follow his late master and see that he embarked for Mekka. Bairam was greatly irritated at this proceeding, and turning short to Bikaner, placed his family under the care of his adopted son and broke out into rebellion. But he had to learn the wide difference of the situation of a rebel against the Mughal, and the trusted chief officer of the Mughal. On reaching Dipalpur, the news overtook him that his adopted son had proved false to his trust and had turned against him. Resolved, however, to rouse the Jalandhar Duab, he pushed on for that well-known locality, only to encounter on its borders the army of the Governor of {90} the Punjab, Atjah Khan.

In the battle that followed Bairam was defeated, and fled to Tilwara on the Sutlej, thirty miles to the west of Ludhiana. Akbar, who had been on his track when his lieutenant encountered and defeated him, followed his late Atalik, and reduced him to such straits that Bairam threw himself on his mercy. Then Akbar, remembering the great services he had rendered, pardoned him, and, furnishing him with a large sum of money, despatched him on the road to Mekka. Bairam reached Gujarat in safety, was well received there by the Governor, and was engaged in making his preparations to quit India, when he was a.s.sa.s.sinated[4] by a Lohani Afghan whose father had been killed at the battle of Machciwara. Akbar, meanwhile, had returned to Delhi (November 9, 1560). He rested there a few days and then pushed on to Agra, there to execute the projects he had formed for the conquest, the union, the consolidation of the provinces he was resolved to weld into an empire. His reign, indeed, in the sense of ruling alone without a minister who a.s.sumed the airs of a master, commenced really from this date. The Atalik, who had monopolised the power of the State, was gone, and the future of the country depended now entirely upon the genius of the sovereign.