3. The Emperors were not in the least ashamed of this practice, and robbed the families of rich merchants as well as those of officials. In fact they levied in a rough way the high 'death duties' so much admired by Radicals with small expectations. Some remarkable cases are related in detail by Bernier (Bernier, Travels, ed. Constable, and V. A. Smith (1914), pp. 163-7). When Aurangzēb heard of the death of the Governor of Kābul, he gave orders to seize the belongings of the deceased, so that 'not even a piece of straw be left' (Bilimoria, Letters of Aurungzebe, No. xcix).
4. The meaning of this sentence is obscure.
5. Corresponding to A.D. 1753-4. In the original edition the date is misprinted A.D. 1167.
6. The tomb of Mansūr Alī Khān is better known as that of Safdar Jang, which was the honorary title of the noble over whom the edifice was raised. He was the wazīr, or chief minister, of the Emperor Ahmad Shāh from 1748 to 1752, and was practically King of Oudh, where he had succeeded to the power of his father-in-law, the well-known Saādat Khān: Safdar Jang died in A.D. 1754 and was succeeded in Oudh by his son Shujā-ud-daula.
The author's praise of the beauty of Safdar Jang's tomb will seem extravagant to most critics. In the editor's judgement the building is a very poor attempt to imitate the inimitable Tāj. Fergusson (ed. 1910, vol. ii, p. 324, pl. xxxiv) gives it the qualified praise that 'it looks grand and imposing at a distance, but it will not bear close inspection'. See Fanshawe, p. 246 and plate. In the original edition a coloured plate of this mausoleum is given.
7. Nizām-ud-dīn was the disciple of Farīd-ud- dīn Ganj Shakar, so called from his look being sufficient to convert cods of earth into lumps of sugar. Farīd was the disciple of Kutb-ud-dīn of Old Delhi, who was the disciple of Mūin-ud-dīn of Ajmēr, the greatest of all their saints. [W. H. S.] Mūin-ud-dīn died A.D. 1236. For further particulars of the three saints see Beale, Oriental Biographical Dictionary, ed. Keene, 1894. Dr. Horn (Ep. Ind. ii, 145 n., 426 n.) gives information about the Persian biographies of Nizām-ud-dīn and other Chishtī saints.
8. For the personal history of Nizām-ud-dīn see the last preceding chapter, [13]. His tomb is situated in a kind of cemetery, which also contains the tombs of the poet Khusrū, the Princess Jahānārā, and the Emperor Muhammad Shāh, which will be noticed presently. Fanshawe (p. 236) gives a plan of the enclosure. Nizām-ud-dīn's tomb 'has a very graceful appearance, and is surrounded by a verandah of white marble, while a cut screen encloses the sarcophagus, which is always covered with a cloth. Round the gravestone runs a carved wooden guard, and from the four corners rise stone pillars draped with cloth, which support an angular wooden frame-work, and which has something the appearance of a canopy to a bed. Below this wooden canopy there is stretched a cloth of green and red, much the worse for wear. The interior of the tomb is covered with painted figures in Arabic, and at the head of the grave is a stand with a Korān. The marble screen is very richly cut, and the roof of the arcade-like verandah is finely painted in a flower pattern. Altogether there is a quaint look about the building which cannot fail to strike any one. A good deal of money has at various times been spent on this tomb; the dome was added to the roof in Akbar's time by Muhammad Imām-ud- dīn Hasan, and in the reign of Shāh Jahān (A.D. 1628 [sic., leg. 1627]-58) the whole building was put into thorough repair. . . . The tomb is in the village of Ghyāspur, and is reached after passing through the 'Chaunsath Khambhā'. (Harcourt, The New Guide to Delhi (1866), p. 107.)
In the original edition a small coloured illustration of this tomb, from a miniature, is given on Plate 24. Carr Stephen (pp. 102- 7) gives a good and full account of Nizām-ud-dīn and his tomb.
9. According to Harcourt (p. 108), the tomb of Khusrū was erected about A.D. 1350, but this is a misprint for 1530. The poet, whose proper name was Abūl Hasan, is often called Amīr Khusrū, and was of Turkish origin. He was born A.D. 1253, and died in September, 1325. His works are numerous. (Beale.) The grave, and wooden railing round it, were built in A.H. 937 (A.D. 1530-1). . . . The present tomb was built in A.H. 1014 (A.D. 1605-6) by Imād-ud-dīn Hasan, in the reign of Jahāngīr, and this date occurs in an inscription under the dome and over the red sandstone screens. (Carr Stephen, p. 115.) In the original edition a small coloured illustration of this tomb, from a miniature, is given on Plate 24. See Fanshawe, p. 241.
10. Akbar II, who died in 1837.