At his death its destination is changed—the founder’s remains are interred beneath the central dome. Sometimes his favourite wife lies beside him; but more generally his family and relations are buried beneath the collateral domes. When once used as a place of burial, its vaults never again resound with festive mirth. The care of the building is handed over to priests and cadis, who gain a scanty subsistence by the sale of the fruits of the garden, or the alms of those who come to visit the last resting-place of their friend or master. Perfect silence takes the place of festivity and mirth. The beauty of the surrounding objects combines with the repose of the place to produce an effect as graceful as it is solemn and appropriate.
Though the tombs, with the remains of their enclosures, are so numerous throughout all India, the Taje Mehal, at Agra, is almost the only tomb that retains its garden in anything like its pristine beauty, and there is not perhaps in the whole world a scene where nature and art so successfully combine to produce a perfect work of art as within the precincts of this far-famed mausoleum.
The tomb of Humayun Shah, the first of the Moguls who was buried in India, still stands tolerably entire among the ruins of Old Delhi, of which indeed it forms the principal and most striking object. It stands well on a lofty square platform, adorned with arches, whose piers are ornamented with an inlay of white marble. The tomb itself is an octagonal apartment, of considerable dimensions, crowned by a dome of white marble, of very graceful contour externally. Four sides of the octagon are occupied by the entrances; to the other four smaller octagonal apartments are attached, making up a building nearly a square in plan, with only the angles slightly cut away.[543] Its plan is in fact that afterwards adopted at the Taje ([Woodcut No. 338]), but used here without the depth and poetry of that celebrated building. Its most marked characteristic, however, is its purity—it might almost be called poverty—of design. It is so very unlike anything else that Akbar ever built, that it is hardly possible it could have been designed by him. It has not even the picturesque boldness of the earlier Pathan tombs, and in fact looks more like buildings a century at least more modern than it really is. It is, however, a noble tomb, and anywhere else must be considered a wonder.
Humayun’s tomb, however, is so well known from drawings and photographs, that, in order to illustrate the architecture of the day, it may be preferable to take the contemporary tomb of Mohammad Ghaus at Gualior, which certainly was erected during the early part of Akbar’s reign, and is a singularly interesting example of the tombs of the period. It is a square, measuring 100 ft. each way, exclusive of the hexagonal towers, which are attached to the angles ([Woodcut No. 327]). The chamber of the tomb itself is a hall 43 ft. square, with the angles cut off by pointed arches so as to form an octagon, on which the dome rests. Around this square building is a gallery, 20 ft. wide between the piers, enclosed on all sides by a screen of the most exquisite tracery in pierced stone-work with a projecting porch on each face ([Woodcut No. 328]).[544]
327. Plan of Tomb of Mohammad Ghaus, Gualior. Scale 50 ft. to 1 in.
On comparing this with the tomb of Shere Shah at Sasseram, which in many respects it resembles to a considerable extent, it will be seen that it marks a considerable progress in tomb-building during even the short period that elapsed between the erection of the two. There is an inherent weakness in an octagonal form as compared with the square, that even the Pathans never quite successfully conquered; and the outward screen of trellis-work is far more elegant than the open arcade of the Sasseram tomb. Something may be due to the fact that Gualior was a city where building of an ornamental character had long been going on, and where consequently a superior school of masons and architects may always have existed, while Sasseram was a remote country village, where these advantages were unknown. But be this as it may, the progress is such in so short a time, that we can only ascribe it to the invigorating touch of Akbar’s genius, which was afterwards to work such wonders.