Practically, there was little difference in the system of Government under Hindu and Mahomedan rule. In both, the supreme power was easy of access. Petitions could be brought to the final authority without any difficulty, and a certain rough justice undoubtedly prevailed.
The king hired and paid for a portion of the army which he mounted on his own horses, but a large number of men came in independent parties under leaders of their own.
Such was the India which Humâyon left behind him for twelve long years. His adventures during this time are less entertaining than the wanderings of that prince of Bohemians, his father, but they are still interesting.
When he crossed the Persian border, he found himself received with a certain contemptuous pity. Still, female servants were sent to attend on the queen, and demonstrations were made in his favour. Arrived at the court of King Tahmâsp, however, the exiled monarch of India found himself by no means on a bed of roses. Even the gift of the greatest treasure he possessed, a huge diamond, did not ameliorate his situation; for Shâh Tahmâsp affected to despise the jewel, and is said to have sent it away disdainfully in a gift to the King of the Dekkan. But the whole history of this diamond, which has now disappeared, is a fine romance. It is said to have been the eye of Shiv-ji in some shrine, and to have passed into the possession of many conquerors, until it was given to Babar in recognition of chivalrous kindness and courtesy shown to them by the family of the Râjah of Chitore. Babar, who kept nothing for himself, gave the stone, "worth half the daily expenditure of the world," to his son. It is said to have weighed about 280 carats, and to have been of the purest water; it is also conjectured that it reappeared as the Great Moghul diamond which Tavernier describes as belonging to Shâh-jahân, and that possibly it is this very stone which, cleft and badly cut, still shines as the Koh-i-nur.
It did not, anyhow, avail Humâyon much. More effective was his servile consent to wear the red cap of the Persian, and by this becoming a khizil bash, renounce his Sunni faith, and proclaim himself a Shiah. He did not do this without much pressure, and at the very last nearly broke bondage; but the promise of ten thousand horse wherewith to recover his kingdom was too tempting. With this force he attacked Kandahâr, where his brother Âskari still held little Akbar as a hostage; or, rather, had so held him until the attacking army loomed over the horizon, when, after some hesitation as to whether it would not be wiser to send the boy under honourable escort to his father, Âskari decided on obeying his brother Kamrân's orders, and despatched the little prisoner to Kâbul. The story of that inclement winter march across the hills, with its attempts at rescue and numberless adventures, would make a charming book for English children.
After five months siege, Kandahâr surrendered, "Dearest Lady" having succeeded in obtaining a promise of pardon for Âskari from his brother. It was revoked, however, in an altogether indefensible manner, and Âskari was kept in chains for the next three years. This is so unlike Humâyon's usual conduct towards his brothers, that it gives colour to the assertion made by some authorities that Âskari's punishment was due to the discovery of a further offence.
After Kandahâr had capitulated, Humâyon marched on Kamrân and Kâbul. This is the march rendered famous by Sir Donald Stewart in the Afghân War, and by Lord Roberts' subsequent and rapid repetition. It was now winter, which had set in with extraordinary severity, and much of the country was under snow. Half-way to Kâbul Humâyon was joined by his brother Hindal, who, with brief intervals of hesitation, appears to have been fairly faithful. Their amalgamated armies proved too formidable for Kamrân to face, though at first he had prepared for extremities by removing little Akbar from his grand-aunt "Dearest Lady's" care, and giving the lad to a trusted creature of his own; so flight to Ghuzni followed. The child, however, remained, and Humâyon's delight at recovering his little son was great. Taking the boy in his arms, he exclaimed: "Joseph was cast by envious brethren into the pit; but in the end he was exalted to great glory, as thou shalt be, my son."
Only remaining in Kâbul long enough to restore the young prince to safer keeping, Humâyon set off in pursuit of his brother, who, finding the gates of Ghuzni closed against him, had fled to the Indus; but while on this campaign Humâyon fell so sick that his life was despaired of. After two months' confinement to bed he recovered, only to find himself deserted by his troops, and to hear that Kamrân, returning to Kâbul one dawn, had managed to slip in with a chosen band of followers as the city gates were being opened, had murdered the governor in his bath, had put out the eyes of Fazl and Muttro, the young prince's foster-brothers and playfellows, and had given the young prince himself into the charge of unkindly eunuchs. It was an anxious moment, and the almost despairing father, still weak from illness, set himself to beat up recruits and march to recover his capital, recover his son. Kamrân's troops, meeting with a reverse in the suburbs of the city, where--this being April--the peach-blossom must have been all ablow, Humstyon was enabled to establish himself on an eminence which commands the town, and to commence shelling it. Whereupon Kamrân sent a message to say that if the cannonade continued, he would expose the young heir to all his father's high hopes on the wall where the fire was hottest. A brutal threat, upon the carrying out of which history stands divided, some authorities saying that Akbar was so exposed, others declaring that Humâyon ordered the artillery to cease firing.
Be that as it may, on the 28th of April he entered the city in triumph, Kamrân having fled the previous night.
So little Akbar was once more in his father's arms. In his mother's also, ere long, for Hamida-Bânu-Begum rejoined her husband in the spring. Regarding this, a pretty story is told by Aunt Rosebody in her Memoirs. Humâyon, ever a lover of pleasure, devised a sumptuous entertainment to welcome his wife, and amongst the many devices for amusement was this. All the ladies of the family, unveiled, resplendent in jewels, were to range themselves in a circle round a hall; and to this dazzling company the baby-prince--he was but four--was to be introduced to choose for himself a mother! One can imagine the scene. Those laughing faces-all but one--around the child who had not seen her he sought for two long years. The pause for hesitation, the sickening suffocation of one heart, the sudden sense of shyness, of loneliness, making one little mouth droop.