CHAPTER I.
The fort of Gualior was in a state of siege. Tartar Chan was at this time governor of it; but being beleagured by the Rajah of that country, to whose family it had formerly belonged, and not in a condition to resist the numerous forces of the Hindoo, Tartar Chan solicited Babur’s aid. The detachment of troops sent by the Mogul monarch defeated the Rajah, and obliged him to raise the siege. The governor being now released from his enemies, and repenting of his promise of submission, delayed, under plausible but frivolous pretences, to put the Moguls in possession of the fortress. Their general, therefore, retreated in disgust, with a threat of soon coming in larger force to compel this fulfilment of the conditions upon which his services had been expressly rendered.
The Moguls had no sooner retired than the Rajah returned with his forces and invested Gualior. Tartar Chan was again in a dilemma, but feared making another application to the Mogul Emperor, whom he had lately requited with such signal ingratitude.
Within the fort was one Sheik Mahomed Ghows, a very learned man, who had a great number of students under him, and was looked upon as an oracle throughout the province. He was consulted in all cases of emergency, being thought to possess the gift of inspiration. In his difficulty, Tartar Chan repaired to the sage, and asked him what was to be done under the present unpromising aspect of his affairs.
“We have not provisions,” said he, “for more than a few weeks; and the garrison is already so much reduced that a sally cannot be prudently attempted. What is to be done?”
“You have but a choice of evils; you must propitiate the Mogul.”
“But how?”
“Deliver the fortress into his hands.”
“Then I may as well capitulate to the enemy.”
“No; from the Hindoos you may look for extermination, from the worshippers of the Prophet you may hope to retain your government in fealty to the Emperor.”
“No vassal is secure under the domination of despotism.”
“What security have you within these walls, surrounded by an implacable enemy whom you acknowledge you are in no condition longer to resist, and who are prepared to exercise against you the severities which conquerors seldom fail to inflict upon the vanquished, whom they happen to hate? You have asked my advice under your present difficulties;—I give it. Make your peace with the Mogul Emperor, perform the conditions upon which he lately granted you assistance against the foe, by giving him possession of this fortress, only stipulating to retain the command of it as his vassal.”
Though Tartar Chan did not much relish the advice of the sage, he nevertheless saw that he had no choice between complying and capitulating to the Hindoos. He therefore despatched a messenger, who succeeded in passing through the enemy’s lines as a fakeer—for those visionaries pass everywhere unmolested—entreating the Emperor Babur to advance once more to his assistance, and offering him full security for the performance of the conditions upon which he solicited his aid.
About five weeks after the consultation just described, the garrison was reduced to extreme distress. Their provisions were diminished to such an incompetent supply that every person was put upon a stated allowance of four ounces of rice per day. Disease was already beginning the work of destruction, and there appeared no chance of escaping the horrors of famine except by a speedy capitulation. The cries of lamentation were everywhere heard, but no relief came. The prospect of the besieged was anything but cheering; with starvation on the one hand, and an odious captivity on the other, they had only a choice of miseries, unless aid should be obtained before the expiration of another week.
Tartar Chan did his best to soften the privations of the garrison; but as he could not fabricate grain, he could do little towards hushing the doleful cries of suffering which everywhere met his ears. The besiegers were so vigilant that they cut off all supplies, and were determined to starve their enemies into a surrender.
One evening four horsemen were seen by the Rajah’s scouts, advancing towards Gualior. They were Moguls, and appeared to be sturdy warriors, being well-armed and well mounted. They entered a thicket.
“Baba Shirzad,” said the chief, “do you ride towards the fort at your best speed, and endeavour to ascertain the strength of the besieging force. We will await your return here, and act according to circumstances. I like an achievement: the greater danger, the more glory.”
“I go,” said the Mogul; “but to my thinking you are poking your nose into a wasp’s nest, and you know how severely those insects sting.”
“But we must pluck out their sting, Baba, and then they’ll only be able to buzz.”
“But in plucking out the sting we may chance to get a puncture.”
“Ha! so much the better; ’twill be a spur to renown; so strike your heels into the flanks of your good Arab, and away.”
Baba Shirzad did as he was commanded, and was lost in a few seconds amid the gloom of the forest.
“Mir Shah,” said the chief to another of his companions, “we must prepare for blows. These idolators are grown savage at their late defeats and fight desperately. We must relieve the garrison in spite of Tartan Chan’s late subterfuges. He’ll be a cunning governor if he outwits his betters a second time.”
“Had we not better get into the plain?” asked Mir Shah. “I don’t like these strange thickets; they are too favourable for surprises, and my topographical knowledge of this quarter is not considerable. Let us go where we can see our horses’s ears, for here we can exercise only one sense, and that the least important of the five.”
“Nay, do you mean to make four pass for a unit? You can exercise all your senses in the dark, save the faculty of seeing, and, my word for it, blindness is not always an evil. But let us get into the plain if you will, and there await the return of Baba Shirzad.”
The Moguls had not long emerged from the wood, when, overcome by the fatigue of their journey, they began to nod on their saddles. They were, however, suddenly roused by a clattering of hoofs, as of a horse at full speed, and presently Baba Shirzad appeared coming towards them at a hard gallop.
“Fly!” said he; “we are pursued by a large detachment of the enemy; they are close at my heels, and we have not a moment for deliberation.”
“Nay,” said the chief, “the Mogul is not accustomed to fly we must stand our ground at all risks.”
“But the enemy are at least a hundred and fifty men.”
“The more the better; throw them into confusion and they’ll cut one another’s throats. ’Tis no easy matter to distinguish friends from foes in the dark, and after a death or two they’ll magnify two brace of warriors into a host. Stand by me like brave men, and I’ll show you some sport worth witnessing.”
By this time a considerable detachment of the enemy had advanced to within a hundred yards of the spot where the four horsemen stood. The Moguls had separated, each taking up his position with his back towards the wood, and shouting simultaneously, in order to lead the enemy to suppose they formed a small squadron. The Hindoos reined up their horses, and immediately winged a flight of arrows, calling upon their foes to surrender; this was answered by a discharge of four shafts, which, being directed with better aim, and against a large mass, did some execution.
The Hindoo chief was mounted upon a white charger, which was a guide to the Moguls in what direction to shoot their arrows. The four horsemen now uniting galloped towards the enemy, and when within ten yards of them, discharged their barbed reeds, turned and retreated. This they repeated several times, until the enemy, galled by these attacks, spurred forward in pursuit. The Moguls again separated, and plunged into the neighbouring thicket. The Hindoos being thus disunited rode onward in disorder, and frequently mistook one another for foes. Arrows were occasionally shot from the wood, and not knowing whence the mischief came, their confusion increased. In several instances they rode each other down, the enemy meanwhile occasionally shouting to delude them, and then instantly galloping to another position.
This strange fight was continued for some time, until a number of the idolators being slain, their leader ordered those who were near him to halt, and after a while, with some difficulty he mustered the rest of his detachment, nineteen of whom were killed or missing. The night was too dark to allow of pursuing the Moguls with any reasonable chance of securing them; the Hindoos therefore retraced their way slowly back to their camp to prepare their comrades against surprise.
“Well,” said the Mogul leader, as the enemy slowly retired, “I told you we should multiply. Night is the best season in the world to enable the few to outdo the many. They’ll have a rare tale to tell when they get to their tents. They have left a few of their companions behind them, whom they’ll find cold enough and not over fragrant in the morning. But it will not do for four to stand against a hundred by daylight, we must therefore retire towards the advancing forces. Within a week these worshippers of dumb divinities shall quit yonder fortress or fight for it; and though the dogs are brave enough, yet they have no great skill at warfaring.”
“But what say you,” asked Dost Nasir, “to their Rajpoots—fellows that fight under a saffron robe till their throats are cut, not indeed so much to their own satisfaction as to that of their slayers?”
“Why, I say of their Rajpoots, that they are brave just as a woman is when spirit has turned her brain. She’ll then rave and sputter in spite of stripes; but when her fit of valour subsides, her spirit becomes as puny as a lizard’s. I never knew a really brave man wantonly throw away his life. Excite a coward beyond the boundary-line of his fears, and he foams and snaps like a mad dog; but fury is not valour.”
“It may be,” replied Dost Nasir; “but a Rajpoot’s fury is a nasty thing to come in contact with. And the rascals are so ready in the use of their cimetars that they chop off heads as dexterously as your cooks decollate ortolans for a dainty feeder. I never knew a fight tame where those yellow-robed warriors appeared among the enemy’s ranks.”
“Well, if there be any among those adorers of chiselled stones now before yonder town, you shall have an opportunity of seeing that such drunken valour will not prevent our forces from obliging them to slink back to their homes, or making a dunghill beneath the walls of Gualior with the flesh of idol-worshippers.”
While this conversation was going on, the four Moguls were getting into the heart of the jungle, in order to obviate the pursuit which they apprehended the enemy would commence on the morrow. Having deviated considerably from the regular travelling route, and being unacquainted with the locality, they got into a pathless forest. This was a dilemma from which they must use their wits to be delivered, and with this prudent resolution they cast themselves upon the protection of Him to whom the path of the wilderness is as familiar as that of the populous country.