Ma´sūm had designated his son Sayyid Haydar Tūra as his successor; but the new sovereign had to reckon with three paternal uncles, `Omar Bi, Fāzil Bi, and Mahmūd Bi, who raised the standard of revolt in the northern provinces. Amīr Haydar[481] marched against them at the head of an army so powerful as to render resistance impossible. The rebels threw themselves into strong places, but were driven from these retreats by concentrated artillery fire. Two of them, `Omar Bi and Fāzil Bi, were tracked to a village by the Amīr’s troops, were captured and put to death; while Mahmūd Bi, the third, sought safety in Kokand.[482] Amīr Haydar’s store of energy was apparently exhausted by this early test. He permitted Iltuzar Khān of Khiva to ravage the suburbs of his capital, and not until the cry of his suffering subjects could no longer be disregarded did he give orders for an expedition to avenge their woes. It consisted of 30,000 Uzbegs under the command of a general of distinction named Mahammad Niyāz Bi. The avenging host followed the course of the Amū Daryā until the confines of Khiva had been reached.[483] In the meantime, Iltuzar, overjoyed at the prospect of victory, crossed the Amū Daryā in the enemy’s rear and established himself in an entrenched camp with 4000 chosen men. The invaders were on the horns of a dilemma. To leave the river was to enter a waterless desert, wherein none would emerge alive; while retreat to Bokhārā was barred by the Khivans’ entrenchments. In desperation they attacked the foe with suddenness and vigour, driving them into the Amū Daryā and securing a decisive victory. Khiva lay open to their attack, but the pusillanimous Haydar was content to rest on his vicariously won laurels, and to pass the rest of his reign in the practice of a pharisaical piety and association with priests, who ruled the people in his name with a rod of iron. As is too frequently the fate of Oriental princes, he was unable to resist the enervating influence of the harem, and lost his power of initiative by wallowing in licensed debauchery.[484] He died in 1826, after an inglorious reign of twenty-seven years.
CHAPTER XXIX
Amīr Nasrullah, a Bokhāran Nero
In writing of the monkish Haydar’s successor, Vambéry appositely quotes an old Uïghūr proverb, “The princes of an age are its mirrors.”[485] Nasrullah Khān epitomised the vices which flourished unchecked in Bokhārā. The passion for low intrigue, the lust and cruelty, the self-righteousness and hypocrisy so often associated with the Mohammedan character, were found in him in their highest development.
As the third son of Haydar, he had small chance of succeeding to the throne; but he kept that goal constantly in view during his father’s lifetime, and paved the way thither by pandering to the greed of the military caste. No opportunity was lost of gaining adherents among the Amīr’s courtiers. Hākim Bi, the Kushbegi, or vezīr, and his father-in-law Ayāz Topchi-bāshi,[486] who held an important military command, were devoted to his interests.[487]
On Haydar’s death, his eldest son, Husayn Khān, took possession of the citadel of Bokhārā and was proclaimed Amīr. He received fervent assurances of loyalty from Nasrullah, who was the while actively plotting to subvert his authority, and who held a council of war at Karshī, at which Mū´min Beg Dādkhāh, one of Husayn’s chief lieutenants, assisted.
At this crisis he learnt that his brother had died suddenly after a reign of barely three months, and took immediate steps to assert his claims.[488] He obtained a legal decision in his favour from the chief-justice of Karshī, who also invited the clergy of Samarkand to espouse his cause. In the meantime another brother named `Omar Khān seized the reins of power at Bokhārā, and sent orders to the governor of Samarkand on no account to surrender his charge. But on Nasrullah’s arrival the gates were flung open to him by the influence of the mullās, and he was enthroned on the famous Blue Stone, or Kok-tāsh, whereon nearly every Amīr since Tīmūr’s reign had received investiture. Then began a triumphant progress throughout the realm. Katti-Kurgān, Kerminé, and other cities surrendered to the pretender, who replaced their governors by creatures of his own, and bade the former swell his train. Thus attended, he arrived before Bokhārā and closely invested the city. Starvation soon decimated its swarming population. A pound of meat sold for seven tangas,[489] flour was introduced through Nasrullah’s trenches in coffins, and the stench of stagnant water in the irrigation canals grew intolerable. The Kushbegi and his father-in-law Ayāz took advantage of the people’s agony to proffer their submission, and undertook to give the signal of capitulation by blowing up an ancient cannon, said to have weighed nearly thirteen tons.[490] On hearing the muffled roar of the explosion, Nasrullah immediately attacked the city from two quarters, and entered it in triumph on the 22nd March 1826. `Omar saved his life by instant flight, but three of his brothers, with many of their adherents, were butchered in cold blood.[491]
COURT-YARD OF A HOUSE IN SAMARKAND
The policy with which Nasrullah inaugurated his reign partook of the ingrained cunning which was his chief characteristic. He seemed to prefer amusements to affairs of state, and thus induced the Kushbegi to believe that his own lease of power would be indefinitely prolonged. Meantime no occasion was lost of strengthening his hold on the lower classes by acts of apparent generosity and justice. The motto on his seal was that adopted by the noble-hearted Tīmūr, whom he affected to regard as his prototype. It was “Truth and Equity”![492] When he felt himself strong enough to throw off the mask, he banished his benefactor to Karshī, and afterwards to Samarkand. Ayāz Topchi-bāshi’s suspicions were lulled by ardent asseverations of friendship, lest he should make away with the vast possessions which Nasrullah had long marked as his own. He summoned the old man to his presence, gave him a beautiful horse, and aided him to vault into the saddle with his own royal hands.[493] The victim set out for Samarkand, of which he had been appointed governor, in the assurance that he had not participated in his son-in-law’s disgrace; but he was soon ordered back to Bokhārā, and thrown into prison with the Kushbegi. To Nasrullah’s eternal disgrace, he put both of these early friends to death in the spring of 1840. Then he turned his attention to the military class, which had attained preponderance in an empire won and kept together by the sword. They were butchered in large numbers without any form of trial, or banished to a distance from the capital. The clergy had been permitted by his bigoted predecessor to meddle in the affairs of state, and even the warrior-prince Ma´sūm had not ventured to thwart them. Nasrullah overturned their authority, and substituted his royal commands for the hitherto sacred injunctions of law and custom.[494]