"Yea!" assented Ali-Jân, "but I would he had as fine a sense of danger. Dost know that he hath put on four Hindustâni cooks to his Royal Kitchen, because forsooth, he hath never tasted the dishes of this accursed country and must needs try them?"
"Aye!" said Mahomed Bakshi, who was Superintendent-of-the-Household, "and what is worse, they be the Royal cooks of the late King! Heard you ever such fool-hardiness? Lo! I have put on two new tasters; but what is that? These idolaters have strange ways and strange poisons."
"And strange dishes!" put in Târdi-Beg. "Lo! I eat none at the Emperor's supper parties."
"Nor I," chorused several.
"Gentlemen!" said Mahomed Bakshi. "You speak without thought for the interior of a kitchen. Poison may go into any pot. 'Twere better to eat nothing. Then would my labours be less."
"Thy percentages also," laughed a recognised wit. "Heed him not, gentlemen. 'Tis but his way of keeping our stomachs empty, so that more profit fills his pocket."
So the subject was dismissed with a joke; though in truth it was far from being one. For Babar's somewhat reckless appointment of these four Hindustâni cooks, had set in train one of those fine-drawn female plots to poison which seem inseparable from the seclusion of women. It is as if the concentrated, confined vitality, denied outlet in natural ways, seeks expression in pure venom. The late Sultân-Ibrahîm's mother lived, by Babar's generosity, in comparative State. He had assigned lands to her, treated her with the utmost respect, and when he addressed her, did so as "mother." But the mere chance of having a Hindustâni cook in the royal kitchen was too much for gratitude.
The result Babar wrote to Mahâm when, considerably the worse for the incident, he was still living on water-lily flowers brayed in milk.
"The ill-fated lady, having heard of my appointment of cooks, delivered no less than a quarter of an ounce of poison to a female slave and sent it to Ahmed, her taster, wrapped up in a folded paper. He, seducing the man by promise of vast lands, handed it to one of the cooks, desiring him by some means or another to throw it into my food. The man did not throw it into the pot, because I had strictly enjoined my tasters ever to watch the Hindustânis; fortunately, therefore, he only threw it into the tray. In this fashion. When they were dishing the meat, my graceless tasters must have been inattentive, for he managed to throw about one-half of the poison on a plate which held some thin slices of bread. These he covered with meat fried in butter. The better half in his haste he spilt in the fireplace.
"It was fried hare. I am very fond of hare, so I ate a good deal and also fried carrot. I was not, however, sensible of any disagreeable taste. But while I was eating some smoked-dried meat I felt nausea. Now the day before while eating this smoke-dried flesh I had detected an unpleasant taste in a part of it. I therefore ascribed my nausea to that incident. But it was not so. I was very ill. Now I have never been ill in that way even after drinking wine. Suspicion therefore crossed my mind immediately. I desired the cooks to be taken into custody, and directed the rest of the meat to be given to a dog, and that it be shut up. The dog became sick, his belly swelled, he could not be induced to rise until noon next day when he rose and recovered. Two young menials in the kitchen who had partaken of the food also suffered. One indeed, was extremely ill, but in the end both escaped.