Frontispiece.
[Page 363].
JEHANGIRE GOING TO VISIT MHER-UL-NISSA.

THE “PRIZE LIBRARY.”

LEGENDARY & ROMANTIC
TALES OF INDIAN HISTORY.

BY
THE REV. HOBART CAUNTER, B.D.

LONDON:
FREDERICK WARNE AND CO.
AND NEW YORK.

PREFACE.

This Volume of Legendary and Romantic Tales of Indian History was one of a series of historical tales founded on the histories of England, France, Spain, Italy, and India, which obtained great popularity when first published.

The copyright of them having passed to the present Publishers, they have been induced to reproduce them in a compact form—complete in a single volume—in the belief that by so doing they will be adding to the literary pleasure of another generation.

PREFACE TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION.

The success of the several series of “Romantic Tales of History” already published has induced the publishers of these works to extend them in order to embrace a portion of history generally considered extremely exuberant in romantic features. The present series will be confined to the Mahomedan conquests in India, in the records of which are to be found numerous events of signal and stirring interest, which, while they develope the character of a distant people in a remote age, serve also to confirm many fine axioms of moral truth by exhibiting how, under all the variations of clime and fluctuations of circumstance, the great result of human actions is everywhere the same.

This being a portion of history with which the general reader is less familiar than with that embraced in the preceding series of this work, the choice has been made under the impression that it may lead to a more extended reading of those annals which contain some of the most interesting facts to be found in the records of ages.

But while I feel that the subject is an important one, I have not been insensible to the difficulties with which it is encompassed, and in proportion to the success of those volumes already before the public has my consciousness of these difficulties been raised, for, feeling that I have had greater impediments to success to overcome, I cannot but be less sanguine in the expectation that I have realized what has been so well done by my predecessors in a similar field.

Romantic as are many of the events which the Mahomedan annals supply, they are nevertheless all of one tone and colouring. They want the delightful blendings and tintings of social circumstances. Their princes were despots, their nobles warriors, their governments tyrannies, and their people slaves. The lives of their most eminent men, who were distinguished chiefly for their deeds in arms, present little else than a series of battles. Their principal amusement was the chase, in which similar perils to those presented in war were courted for the stern glory which followed desperate achievements.

If, therefore, in the following tales the variety should appear less than in those found in the volumes of the same work which have preceded these, the cause, and consequently the excuse, must lie in the materials. Besides this, those beautiful features of domestic life so frequently witnessed in our western world have little or no existence in the land to which the present volumes are devoted. Women confined in harems, and not admitted to the tender and endearing enjoyments of family intercourse, degraded below the dignity of their nature and of their reason, treated as secondary beings, as mere instruments of pleasure, and as created for no better purpose than to perpetuate the human race, are no longer objects either for the rich colouring of romance or the graver delineations of moral narrative.

Great variety of character is not to be found among those isolated beings who are so well calculated to cast a glory upon the human pilgrimage,—not that variety of character does not exist, but it is not developed. All the pictures of life, therefore, among such a community will necessarily possess a certain sameness inseparable from their very nature. I have, however, endeavoured to vary the materials as much as was consistent with the régime of the history, though I sometimes found them very intractable. I can scarcely hope that I have succeeded in a labour of no common difficulty, but trust, nevertheless, that this last series of “Romantic Tales of History” may not be found undeserving of public patronage.

CONTENTS.

HISTORICAL SUMMARY.

Heg. 351. (A.D. 962.)—Aluptugeen, governor of Khorassan, broke out into open rebellion and marched to Ghizny, which he subdued, and there established an independent power. Munsoor, King of Bokhara, hearing of this defection, conferred the government of Khorassan upon Abool-Hussun Mahomed, son of Ibrahim Sunjur Toorkoman, and thrice sent armies to attack Aluptugeen, which were on both occasions defeated. Aluptugeen retained his independence fifteen years, during which his general Subooktugeen frequently defeated the Indians.

Heg. 365. (975.)—Aluptugeen died, and was succeeded by his son Aboo Isaac, who survived his accession but two years.

Heg. 367. (977.)—Subooktugeen was unanimously proclaimed king of Ghizny by the nobles and chiefs. He had married the daughter of Aluptugeen, and became as celebrated for his justice in the administration of his government as for the extraordinary popularity he acquired among his subjects of all conditions. During the first year of his accession, Subooktugeen conquered the province of Candahar. Resolving on a war with India, he marched in that direction, and having taken certain forts, caused mosques to be built, and then returned with considerable spoil to Ghizny.

Jeipal, a powerful prince of India, of the Brahmin caste, raised a numerous body of troops to oppose the Mahomedans, and brought together a great number of elephants, with a design to attack them in their own country; but the King of Ghizny, sending an army to oppose the Indian chief, the hostile forces came in sight of each other on the confines of Lumghan. Here some smart skirmishing ensued, and Mahmood, the son of Subooktugeen, afterwards celebrated as the conqueror of India, though then but a boy, gave proofs of that valour and conduct which so eminently distinguished his future life.

Jeipal’s troops having suffered from a dreadful storm of hail which killed the cattle of the army and several thousand soldiers, their general made proposals for peace, which, contrary to the advice of Mahmood, were accepted by the King of Ghizny.

Jeipal, on reaching his capital, refused to fulfil the conditions, and Subooktugeen again marched his forces towards Lahore. The Indian general advanced to meet and give him battle. The Hindoos were everywhere defeated, and pursued with prodigious slaughter to the banks of the Neelab. By this victory the conqueror acquired immense wealth, and a considerable accession of territory, causing himself to be acknowledged king over the conquered country, and appointing one of his officers with ten thousand horse to the government of Pishawur.

About this time died Munsoor, King of Bokhara; he was succeeded by his son Nooh, against whom a formidable rebellion was raised by a chief named Faik. Nooh having formed an alliance with the King of Ghizny, the rebel was attacked and defeated by the latter, for which signal service the sovereign of Bokhara conferred upon Subooktugeen the title of Nasir-ood-Deen, Hero of the Faith; and upon his son Mahmood that of Syf-ood-Dowla, Sword of the State.

The rebel Faik having again collected his forces, attacked Mahmood unexpectedly and defeated him, taking his baggage. The father hearing of his son’s disaster, marched to his relief, routed the insurgents a second time, and thus completely quashed the rebellion.

Heg. 387. (997.)—Subooktugeen fell into a lingering disorder. Being at this time at Bulkh, he determined to try change of air, and accordingly commenced a journey to Ghizny. He had travelled only a few miles when he was obliged to stop at Toormooz, a town not far from Bulkh, where he expired, his remains being carried to Ghizny for interment.

The Traveller’s Dream.

CHAPTER I.

In the forests of Candahar, a solitary traveller was pursuing his way. Overcome by the heat of noon he sat down on the margin of a small stream that gurgled through the thick underwood, allowing his horse to crop the fresh herbage upon its banks. The scene around him was gloomy but imposing. So thick was the growth of the jungle that the sun’s rays could not penetrate, except here and there, where patches had been cleared by the charcoal-burners or for purposes of fuel; and these were comparatively few. Some of the trees were of a growth so stupendous as to impart a character of sublimity to the whole aspect of the forest. Many of them reached the prodigious height of a hundred and thirty feet, presenting a straight branchless stem, which rose like a colossal pillar from the ground to the altitude of twenty yards without a single branch or even a sprout upon its surface. Under the vast leafy canopy which spread out above it, the wild elephant frequently reposed, and seemed, by comparison with the stately growth beside which it rested, but as some ordinary animal.

It is far from the haunts of men, amid the deep recesses of the forest, or on the summit of the distant mountain, that nature is seen to develop the noblest features of her beauty. The stillness that reigns around, the solemn repose of the scene, not broken in upon by human associations, nor interrupted by the voice of human intercourse, enhance the impression of grandeur produced by the sight of objects which cannot fail to elevate the soul to pious adoration of the great and illimitable God of the universe.

The stranger was impressed by the somewhat painful novelty of his situation, and solemn thoughts were awakened in his heart. He sat calmly gazing upon the brook as it bubbled before him, when his attention was suddenly roused by a crashing of the bushes, immediately accompanied by a loud roar, and in another moment his horse was prostrated by the paw of a huge lion. The traveller started from his seat, drew his sword, and coming behind the ferocious visitor, cut the sinews of its hind leg, and before the animal could turn, repeated the stroke on the other, and thus completely disabled it. The savage instantly relinquished its prey, but so tremendous had been the stroke of its paw and the succeeding laceration so extensive, that the poor horse rolled upon the streamlet’s bank in the agonies of death. The lion roared with appalling fury—its eyes glared—its mane bristled—but it was unable to resent the injury it had received. It dragged itself forward upon its fore-legs with a vain endeavour to retaliate. Its vanquisher approached fearlessly, struck it across the skull with his sword, and, repeating the stroke, laid it dead at his feet.

The loss of his steed was an untoward event, and as he would now have to make his way through the forest on foot,—as, moreover, the sun had long passed its meridian, he determined to pursue his journey without further delay.

Strapping to his shoulders a kind of wallet which had been fastened to his saddle, he commenced threading the thicket. His journey was long and arduous, but on emerging into an open space, he saw a doe grazing with her fawn. The latter had just been born, and the traveller coming suddenly upon them, secured the little one, while the affrighted dam fled in terror. Pleased with his capture, he bound the fawn’s legs, and placing it under his arm, proceeded on his way.

He now quitted the cleared space, and plunged again into the jungle, satisfied at having procured something to relieve his hunger, should he be obliged to pass the night in the forest. When he had at length reached a convenient spot where he might prepare a meal, he placed the fawn beside the trunk of a blasted tree, and having kindled a fire by the friction of two dry pieces of wood, he was about to sacrifice the little animal, but perceiving the mother at a short distance gazing upon him with an expression of the deepest distress, he paused. The tears rolled down her cheeks—her head was raised, and her eyes intently fixed upon the stranger’s countenance. They next turned upon her innocent offspring that lay bound at the root of the tree, unconscious of its danger, but still yearning for its parent. She gradually advanced within a few yards of the spot on which the traveller stood. He retired several paces; the anxious dam immediately sprang towards its young, lay down by it, and caressed it with an intelligible joy. On the traveller’s approach she quitted her fawn with a bound of terror, but still retreated only a few yards, manifesting the strongest symptoms of maternal suffering.

It was an affecting sight—an irresistible appeal to human sympathy. The heart of the stranger was moved to pity, his bosom heaved with generous emotion, and under the impulse of a fervid and holy exultation he released the fawn from his captivity. The tender creature instantly ran to its mother, which, with a cry of joy, passed forward towards the thicket; but before she was secluded from the sight of him who had delivered her young from death, she turned round as if with a look of grateful acknowledgment, and plunged with her delicate offspring into the close cover of the forest.

This was an act to gladden the heart of a good man. Life is the blessed boon of Heaven, and the greatest of its gifts: to the mere animal, the loss of it is the loss of all; and yet how wantonly does man trifle with the life of animals, to which it is an object of such high enjoyment; for dumb creatures, having no apprehension of pain, possess the highest sense of mere corporeal fruition, so long as they are not actually suffering.

The release of the fawn had softened the stranger’s sympathies and impressed his feelings. Taking from his wallet a small quantity of rice, which had been already boiled, he made a homely but grateful meal, and determined to pass that night on the spot, endeared to him by the consciousness, which it kept alive, of having performed a benevolent action.

It was a heavenly night. The light of a clear moon peeped through the trees, and seemed to dance in ten thousand phosphoric coruscations, as the slender branches, agitated by a gentle evening breeze, diverted its course for the moment, or trembled in its gentle beams. The forest gloom contrasted solemnly with the silvery light of the deep azure expanse above, and the general repose of nature, at that still hour when man retires to rest from the stir and bustle of day, added an additional tone of solemnity to the scene. The beast of prey was abroad, and, as it prowled, its occasional roar was a sort of diapason to nature’s imposing harmony.

The traveller having collected some dried leaves strewed them under the broad foliage of a tree, the branches of which formed a thick canopy within six feet of the ground, and casting himself upon this easy woodland couch, courted that slumber which his fatigue had rendered welcome. His reflections were peaceful. He reverted to the occurrences of the day, and though the loss of his steed was a subject of uneasy recollection, yet it was more than countervailed by the happy remembrance of that little episode in the brief chronicle of his life, which he never afterwards reverted to without satisfaction—the restoration of the fawn to its bereaved dam.

He lay for some time pursuing the quiet tenour of his contemplations, occasionally lapsing into a state of half-consciousness and then reverting, by a sudden impulse of the mind, to perfect, self-possession. At length, overcome by the active process of his thoughts and fatigue of body, he fell into a profound sleep, in which some of the most striking events of the past day were presented to his imagination, combined with new associations, and invested with new hues and a more varied colouring. He dreamed that he was visited by the Prophet, who approached him in shining garments, from which a glory was emitted so dazzling that he could not gaze upon it, and said—“The generosity which you have this day shown to a distressed animal has been appreciated by that God who is the God of dumb as well as of rational creatures, and the kingdom of Ghizny is assigned to you in this world as your reward. Let not your power, however, undermine your virtue, but continue through life to exercise that benevolence towards man which you have done this day towards the brute.” Having uttered these words, the celestial messenger disappeared, and the stranger awoke.

The moon was still bright in the heavens, but he could not again close his eyes in sleep. The vision was too strongly impressed upon his waking senses to allow them to yield to the gentle solicitations of slumber. He arose, and watched the clear “pale planet,” through the trees, as it slowly marched towards the horizon to make way for the brighter dawn.

The dews fell heavily, and a thin silvery mist began to rise and invest every object with an ashy tint, as the moon gradually faded in its far descent behind the distant hills. The grey dawn at length broke slowly over the plain, but was not perceptible to the traveller’s eye until the valleys were flooded with the young dewy light. The mist had thickened. The leaves of the trees dripped with their liquid burthen, and every spot that was not protected by a mantle of thick foliage, presented a bloom of moisture from the atmosphere, that seemed tinted with hues from fairy-land. Each blade of grass curved under its watery load, bending its delicate neck as if proud to bear the pure deposit of the skies. Everything was clothed in the same soft drapery, which was shaken off by the morning breeze, when each object resumed its natural variety of hue, and harmonious conformity of light and shadow.

The traveller gathered together the leaves on which he had slept, kindled them, and taking a small cocoanut hookah from his wallet, smoked his chillam; then, making a scanty meal from the cold rice, refreshed himself with a draught of the dews which he had allowed to drip during the night into a plantain leaf doubled up in the form of a cup.

Although his repast was a spare one, it was taken with a pure relish, and having once more strapped his few articles of baggage upon his shoulders, he prepared to resume his journey; but first turning his face towards the holy city, he offered up his devotions with pious fervour, and supplicated the protection of Heaven through his wanderings.

As he pursued his solitary way through paths to which he was a perfect stranger, he could not help recalling the vision which had haunted his sleep. It had come so vividly before him that he more than half persuaded himself it must have been intended to be a direct revelation from Heaven, and yet, that a man without a name, without a home, a stranger in the land, should become the monarch of a powerful empire, seemed one of those impossibilities only to be dreamed of, but never realised.

To his calmer reflections, the night-vision appeared nothing more than the lively operation of a fancy excited by sleep, and which had been rendered the more keenly alive to impressions from certain peculiar coincidences of events that had deeply interested him, and from those reflex images presented in slumber in consequence of the strong feelings which those coincidences had awakened within him. Nevertheless, in spite of the apparent unreasonableness of the thing promised, the utter improbability of such an event taking place, and the force of his arguments upon the folly of harbouring such a thought, he could not expel from his mind the singular revelation of that night.

CHAPTER II.

The traveller now pursued his way through the intricacies of the jungle, with much difficulty and equal patience. He had not long quitted the spot of his last night’s repose, when, entering a small glade where the wood had been cleared, he perceived a group of eight men, seated round the glowing embers of a fire, some smoking, and others apparently devouring the last of their morning’s meal. Knowing that retreat would be of no avail to secure him from their hostile intentions, if they were enemies, he boldly approached, and inquired his way to the nearest hamlet. One of the men rose, and meeting him, said with a significant laugh,

“Perhaps you wouldn’t mind ending your journey here?”

“Indeed but I should. If you can direct me on my way, well; if not, I have no time for parleying.”

“Good! but travellers that pass through these woods are in the habit of paying for safe-conduct.”

“I require no guide, and therefore must decline the tribute.”

“Hark’ye! Do you think your single arm a match for eight pair? Be advised, and lower your tone. We live here by our good wits, levying contributions when the opportunity invites, and living on what the forest provides, when such opportunities fail us. We must have what you carry upon your shoulders, your money, and your provender, if you have any. When we make our demands, remember we take no denial.”

“Then I am in the presence of robbers?”

“Ay! and what then?”

“This, that I shall not submit to your exactions, though you had a hundred, instead of seven, to back you!”

The robber laughed; and, turning to his comrades, said, “Here’s a fellow that wont be plucked without fluttering; we must try blows to bring down the game, if he chooses to be deaf to persuasion. Come,” said he, turning to the traveller, “get rid of that unsightly hump upon your shoulders, and show how straight a man you are when you stand upright, without an incumbrance.”

“Life,” replied the traveller, “is only to be valued at its worth; and I am ready to relinquish mine, if it be Allah’s will, in defence of my property. ’Tis no great matter for a man to die, who has known little else than crosses in this world, and has nothing better to look forward to. Take heed then, though you be robbers, and such are seldom merciful, how you impede the progress of a desperate man.”

Saying this, he retreated towards a tree, against which he placed himself, and drawing his sword, declared his determination to resist to the death.

The robbers paused, surprised at the determination to oppose himself against such palpable odds; but, in order to prove how the hero had miscalculated his chances, one of the men discharged an arrow, and transfixed his sword-arm, pinning it to the tree. The traveller immediately snapped off the shaft, and raised his arm to strike, but it fell powerless beside him. He was instantly overpowered and disarmed; but upon examining the contents of his load, great was the disappointment of the bandits. They scattered its contents upon the ground, deriding the stranger’s risk of his life for property so valueless.

“Well,” said the robber who had already spoken, “as he keeps no purse, we must make one out of him. His limbs are of the right mould, and your purchasers of slaves will give something for a sturdy labourer. We’ll bid you good-bye when we can provide you a master who knows how to pay for being furnished with a brawny pair of shoulders, that he may lay his own load upon, without carrying them under his own head. Come along; you shall rest quietly till that awkward puncture in your arm is healed, and then you shall be shown the way to the next hamlet.”

The stranger’s arms were bound with his turban, and he was forced to proceed between two of the bandits. They entered the thicket, and after a walk of about five minutes, stood before several rude huts, formed in one of the closest recesses of the forest. These hovels were constructed from various growths of the jungle, a small square spot having been cleared in front, where the outlaws smoked, cooked their curries, and held their councils. Each hut accommodated a family, for all the men were married.

As there was no spare dwelling for the stranger, one was immediately constructed by a couple of the robbers, and completed in about two hours. It consisted of a few slight bamboos, driven into the ground at intervals of a foot, under the foilage of a low tree, which formed the roof. These bamboos were crossed with smaller canes, and the interstices filled with broad leaves and dried grass: the turf being cleared from within, the habitation was complete.

On the third day after his capture, the traveller was commanded to prepare for a change of condition. His wound was doing well, but the arm continued useless. His hands had not been released from the bandage by which they were confined when he was made captive. He was brought out into the area before the huts.

“Now,” said the principal bandit, addressing him, “what say you to a change of life, in the mode at least? We are robbers; our business requires quick heads and stout hearts. You are a brave son of a good mother: what say you to a union of interests with those who, as you see, know how to live, and when provisions get scarce, are not over nice in appropriating them without purchase?”

“I fear,” replied the prisoner, “that I have too quick a conscience for a robber. You had better not trust me: I should betray you.”

“We’ll run the risk; a brave man never can discredit his courage, and to skulk in the track of treachery is the choice only of cowards. We’ll trust you.”

“You would act then with a fool’s discretion; for brave men should be honourable, and ’tis an honourable act to proclaim rogues, who are the bane of society:—not to proclaim them would be an act of treachery against honest men.”

“In truth, I did not take thee for an honest man, though I did for a brave one; but I suspect thee to be neither, and only fit to rub a horse’s crupper, and perform the slave’s drudgery. So be it, thou shalt soon know thy vocation.”

“These bonds are thy security,” said the traveller, raising his hands, which were still tied with the turban. “Cowards are always brave, when they are beyond the reach of danger. Does it become thy manhood to insult a maimed and unarmed man?”

This appeal, though it galled the pride, roused the better spirit of the robber, and he said:—“Well! our notions of valour may be like our notions of honesty; therefore, let both be a divided question; but, since you decline joining your fortune with ours, you must settle our demand for home and nourishment, and as you seem to have no gold of your own, we must turn you into a disposable commodity, and get something for our trouble and care of you.”

The stranger now proceeded with his captors, and, after a march of some hours, they reached a village bordering upon the forest. It consisted of a few miserable huts, and its inhabitants were of the lowest class. Shortly after their arrival, a merchant made his appearance, who purchased the prisoner from the robbers; and he was left with a stranger in the new and unenviable character of a slave. This was anything but a realization of his dream; it however satisfied him, if he harboured a different conviction before, that dreams are the mere fantastic creations of an excited brain, and he felt ashamed of having allowed so flimsy an illusion to obtain one moment’s influence over his mind.

There was nothing to be gained by despondency, and he resolved to submit to his destiny, with a secret trust in God, and a determination to direct the tenour of his life according to the pure suggestions of a rigid and inflexible conscience. So soon as he had become the merchant’s property, the latter examined his wound, and, having carefully dressed it, as carefully felt his chest and limbs, in order to form some idea of the texture of his muscles. This preliminary settled, he expressed himself well satisfied with his purchase. The merchant was a little shrivelled man, with a light brown complexion, exhibiting a dull ochreous tinge, as if in him the whole biliary structure were placed in his head. He had a thin straggling beard, so scattered over the corrugated surface of his sharp-pointed chin, as to give him the appearance of a senile hag, rather than that of a venerable slave-dealer. He was accompanied by several athletic attendants, who amply made up in bone and sinew for the deficiency of their master in both particulars.

Having asked his new slave a few questions respecting his former habits of life, and thus ascertained that he had been accustomed to those hardy exploits likely to have inured his body to endurance, calculating that he should make a handsome profit by his bargain, the thrifty chafferer ordered him to be carefully attended to. After a day’s rest at the village, the merchant directed his route towards Khorassan, whither they arrived, after a laborious journey. The slave was lodged at the house of his purchaser, who fed him well, and used him with sufficient kindness, in order to bring him into the best possible condition for sale. He took care to have it rumoured that he had a stout handsome fellow to dispose of, such as could not be matched in all Persia; in consequence, many persons, willing to purchase, came to see the marvel; but, finding that the description was not exactly borne out by the reality, and the sum demanded being more than they could afford, or were willing to pay, they declined entering upon a bargain.

The merchant began to grow impatient; and, as he was daily incurring an expense without profit, he thought it would be better to abate something of his demand and conclude an immediate sale, than to throw away more money upon the doubtful chance of obtaining a better price. An expedient, however, struck him. Conceiving that bondage could be desirable to no man, it occurred to him that the object of his anxiety and late disappointment might have the means of purchasing his own freedom. When this bright conclusion came across his mind, delighted with the excessive novelty of the thought, he argued that a man ought to pay more for his own liberty than another for the privilege of withholding it from him, because it was a far greater benefit to the one than to the other; and he consequently determined to raise his demand in proportion. With a portentous smile quivering upon his features, he approached the object of his anticipated gain, and said—

“Would you not be glad to enjoy your freedom?”

“You may as well ask a starving man if he loves rice.”

“Are you willing to pay for it?”

“How?”

“In money.”

“No. I am not disposed to buy what is the blessed boon of Heaven, and of this you have no more right to deprive me than I have to cut your throat, which you well deserve, for being the encourager of knaves and the supporter of brigands.”

The old man’s countenance collapsed like a death’s head, and, without uttering a word, he tottered from the presence of his incensed captive, as if stung by a scorpion.

From this time he treated his prisoner with much more rigour than he had hitherto done, and at length came to the resolution of putting a collar round his neck, and forcing him to perform offices of drudgery for a daily compensation. It however fortunately happened that Aluptugeen, Governor of Khorassan, hearing a favourable account of the slave, desired to see him. He accordingly made his appearance, and was immediately purchased by the governor, to the no small gratification of the slave-merchant.

CHAPTER III.

The purchase being completed, the slave was removed to the Governor’s palace. Here he was placed among the household servants; but Aluptugeen, soon perceiving in him the promise of better things, had him about his person, and he shortly became an obvious favourite with his master. This flattering impression continued to increase, and he was at last advanced to a post of some distinction in the state. Seeing in his slave such superior endowments, Aluptugeen one day inquired of him concerning his birth. The slave replied:—

“My history is brief. Though in bondage, I have done nothing to disgrace my parentage. I was born free, though in poverty; I am lineally descended from Yezdijerd, the last of the Persian monarchs, who, as you no doubt well know, when flying from his enemies, during the Caliphate of Othman, was murdered at a water-mill near the town of Murv. His family, being left in Toorkistan, formed connexions among the people, and his descendants have become Toorks. I am now a Toork.

“I was brought into the world amid poverty and destitution; but the very wants to which my youth was subjected forced me to exert the energies with which the Omnipotent had endowed me, and I became at an early age skilled in the sports of the field, of a hardy frame and daring temperament, with the determination of seeking and securing my own fortune. My father, a man of information and letters, in spite of the pressure of penury, did not neglect to instil into my mind the obligations of virtue, and store it with the seeds of wisdom; I may therefore be said to have been better educated than many who figure in the courts of princes.

“From my earliest days, I had entertained a presentiment that the poor Toorkoman’s son was born for something better than to pass his life in indigence and obscurity. Under this impression, false as it has hitherto proved, I quitted my father’s house in my nineteenth year, and was on my way to join the armies of Ghizny, when I fell into the hands of robbers, and have in consequence become the slave of a most generous master.”

Aluptugeen was pleased with the history of his dependent, whom he soon raised to still higher honours under his government. The favourite did not disgrace his freedom, but rose rapidly into favour, until at length was conferred upon him the distinguished title of Ameer-ool-Omrah, chief of the nobles. He became now the first man in Khorassan, and was finally placed at the head of Aluptugeen’s armies. He brought them to a state of the highest order and discipline, led them on to conquest, and was the idol of the troops. The enemies of his master were awed into submission by the superior genius of his general, and peace and prosperity prevailed throughout the empire. His rise to distinction was as signal as it was rapid, and he could not help frequently reverting to his dream in the forest, which appeared gradually advancing towards its accomplishment. His father lived not to see the exaltation of his son, but that son had his mother conveyed to Khorassan, where she enjoyed the happiness of seeing him hailed by the public voice as a great and good man.

What a singular change had come over the destiny of the stranger within the lapse of a few years! The bondsman, who had bent the knee to his superiors, was now bowed to as a great and glorious being. He was the favourite of the Governor of Khorassan; he directed his master’s councils, commanded his armies, and was the oracle of his cabinet. He was constantly with the Governor, and nothing of moment was undertaken without his advice. He was now the happiest of the happy. Beloved by his ruler, the idol of all subjected to his control, the terror of those neighbouring potentates who were hostile to the government of his kind patron—he had scarcely a wish to gratify, and he felt that the clouds which had hung upon the dawn of his career had rendered the succeeding brightness only more vivid and joyous.

Aluptugeen had a beautiful daughter, whose affections were courted by the most powerful nobles of Khorassan; but she continued deaf to their advances. She was a woman of rare endowments, and therefore an object naturally coveted by such a thought themselves in a condition to woo her. She was not to be won. Many, with whom her father would have gladly sought an alliance, were rejected, and the beautiful Zahira remained unwedded. Her coldness was the universal topic of expressed surprise; still she listened not to the voice of the wooer. She was her father’s only child; and he felt naturally anxious, through her, to perpetuate his race: the disappointment therefore saddened him. But there appeared no remedy, as he did not choose to interfere with the antipathies or predilections of a beloved daughter.

As the Ameer-ool-Omrah resided in her father’s palace, Zahira had continual opportunities of seeing him. They frequently met—they frequently conversed—and such meetings and such conversations begat mutual good-will. The quondam slave soon perceived that he was not despised; his admiration for the daughter of his patron grew at length into a warmer feeling, and he became conscious that he loved her. He was aware of the splendid offers that had been made to her, which she had refused. He knew the extreme fastidiousness of her approbation, yet was he disposed to think, or at least to hope, that she might be won to return the ardour which glowed in his bosom towards her.

It was impossible they should frequently meet, without that optical revelation which is invariably made where two hearts throb in unison; and when he was satisfied, by the eloquent exchange of a certain tenderness not to be mistaken, which the eye so legibly communicates when it is really and evidently felt, that his passion for the lovely daughter of Aluptugeen was returned in full force, he no longer hesitated to declare his passion, which declaration was received with an approbation that excited him to a perfect delirium of joy.

“Lady,” said the Ameer-ool-Omrah, in avowing his passion, “though once a slave, I am lineally descended from a long race of kings; your purity of blood will not therefore be tainted by an alliance with one who, from the lowest degradation of bondage has attained to the highest condition of freedom.”

“Noble,” replied the lovely Zahira, “in the choice we make of those who are to guide our destinies, we should look rather to the moral qualities of the man we select, than to those adventitious circumstances which may either make him a sovereign or a beggar. To choose a wealthy man is easy; to choose a man of birth and distinction in the courts of princes is not more difficult. I have had the choice of both; but to select a virtuous man, is one of the few auspicious occurrences of our lives.”

“Lady, I pretend to no virtue, beyond those of the nobles who compose the brilliant assemblage of your father’s court. There is, that I know of, but one main difference between us; they have inherited rank and opulence—it came to them without effort; mine, though descended from a line of kings, has been obtained with the point of my sword.”

“I am content to share with you,” said Zahira earnestly, “the happiness or misery of a united lot, provided my father withhold not his consent; for I have no will, whatever wish I may entertain, apart from his. Duty to a parent is only exceeded in intensity of obligation by duty to a husband, and she who would fail to perform the one, would not be very likely to perform the other.”

“I will immediately seek the Governor, and make known to him our mutual desires. He esteems me highly, as I have reason to believe; but how far his pride may struggle against his friendship, is a circumstance to be ascertained.”

On that very day, the Ameer-ool-Omrah sought an audience with Aluptugeen, and declared his passion for the daughter of that prince. The Governor expressed no surprise, but said, “You know Zahira is my only child—a sweet blossom, that now for sixteen summers has blown round my heart with a purity and a fragrance that has rendered life to me a scene of enviable enjoyment. It is my duty, therefore, no less than my wish, to render that girl happy. She has already been solicited in marriage by four different princes, who possess each an extensive dominion and wide political influence; but she has rejected them. Several nobles of my court have made advances to her with like success. In such a solemn matter I shall neither bias nor direct her. You must, therefore, win her consent before you can obtain mine.”

“I have avowed my passion, and your daughter has condescended to accept my vows. She waits but your decision. If you are averse to our union, my doom is sealed; if you approve of it, my happiness is secured.”

“If you have her consent I shall not withhold mine, and may the blessing of that great and good Being under whose sanction marriages are ratified, attend your union! She has at least fixed her heart upon a worthy man, and I am satisfied.”

The marriage was almost immediately solemnized with great pomp and splendour; and though some of the rejected nobles looked with envy upon the happy bridegroom, it was nevertheless an event that diffused joy throughout the whole district of Khorassan. Shortly after this union, on the death of Abdool Mullik Samany, who reigned over Transoxania, the nobles sent a deputation to consult Aluptugeen regarding a successor. The dynasty of Samany was very powerful. Its power extended over Khwaruzm Marvur-ool-Nehr, Jourjan, Khorassan, Seewustan, and Ghizny. The Kings held their court at Bokhara. When the deputation arrived from Bokhara, Aluptugeen hesitated not to express his opposition to the accession of Prince Munsoor on the plea of his being too young, recommending that his uncle should for the present assume the reins of government.

Before this answer reached the capital, a party had placed Munsoor upon the throne; consequently, when the young King sent a summons for Aluptugeen to show himself at court, the latter, apprehensive that mischief was intended, made excuses, and did not appear. In the year of the Hegira, 351, and 962 of our era, Aluptugeen raised the standard of rebellion and marched to Ghizny, which was subdued by the bravery and conduct of his son-in-law, and there established an independent power.

Munsoor, hearing of this defection, conferred the government of Khorassan on a noble of his own court, and sent armies to attack Aluptugeen, which were successively defeated by the husband of his daughter. This raised the latter still higher in the love and confidence of the troops. His arms were everywhere victorious. The power of Munsoor was abridged, and he began to tremble for the security of his kingdom.

During fifteen years, Aluptugeen retained his independence. He was frequently engaged in war with the Indians, in which his troops were invariably successful. He lived to a good old age, and died A.H. 365, A.D. 975, regretted by his subjects. He was succeeded by his son Aboo-Isaac, who immediately upon his accession proceeded to Bokhara, accompanied by his brother-in-law the Ameer-ool-Omrah. Aboo-Isaac was well received by Munsoor, who granted him a formal commission as governor of Ghizny. His general was likewise appointed by the King as his brother-in-law’s deputy and provisional successor.

Aboo-Isaac survived this event but a short period, when the husband of Zahira was unanimously acknowledged King of Ghizny by the chiefs and nobles. Thus was the dream fulfilled—the quondam slave became a powerful sovereign, and was no less a man than the celebrated Subooktugeen, father of the still more celebrated Mahmood Ghiznevy, who may be termed the first Mahomedan conqueror of India.

HISTORICAL SUMMARY.

Heg. 387 (A.D. 997).—On the death of Subooktugeen, his second son Ismaeel, who had prevailed on his father in the latter’s last moments to appoint him his successor, ascended the throne of Ghizny. Mahmood, though an illegitimate son, disputed his brother’s right of succession; and a battle ensuing between their respective armies, Mahmood prevailed. Ismaeel was immediately confined in a fort in Joorjan; where he remained until his death, and his victorious brother ascended the throne.

Heg. 390 (1000).—Mahmood defeated Khuluf, governor of Seestan. He also marched into India and made himself master of several provinces.

Heg. 391 (1001).—The king of Ghizny obtained a victory over the army of Jeipal, who, together with fifteen sons and near relations, was taken prisoner, five thousand of his troops being slain on the field of battle. Among the spoils were sixteen necklaces inlaid with jewels, one of which, belonging to Jeipal, was valued at a hundred and eighty thousand dinars, the dinar being about the value of nine shillings sterling. Jeipal, having resigned his crown to his son, in compliance with the customs of his race, ordered a funeral pile to be prepared, and setting fire to it with his own hands, perished in the flames.

Heg. 392 (1003).—Mahmood again marched into Seestan and brought Khuluf, the governor, prisoner to Ghizny.

Heg. 395 (1004).—Rajah Beejy Ray, governor of Bhateea, having refused to pay tribute to Anundpal, the son of Jeipal, on whom he was dependent, Mahmood took Bhateea by assault; two hundred and eighty elephants, numerous slaves and other valuable spoils were obtained in the town, which the conqueror annexed, with all its dependencies, to his own dominions.

Heg. 396 (1005).—Elik Khan, king of Kashgar, and father-in-law of Mahmood, invaded the latter’s territory. Mahmood was returning from the siege of Moultan when the news reached him. He immediately hastened to meet the invader, and a desperate battle was fought near Bulkh, in which the king of Kashgar was entirely defeated. This year the king of Ghizny likewise defeated Sewukpal, who had thrown off his allegiance, and made him prisoner. The rebel was compelled to pay four hundred thousand dirhems, about eight thousand three hundred pounds sterling.

Heg. 399 (1008).—Mahmood made himself master the fort of Bheem. There, on account of its vast strength, the Hindoos had deposited the treasure consecrated to their idols, so that the booty obtained by the conqueror was prodigious; the specie alone, independent of plate, bullion, and jewels, is said to have amounted to upwards of three hundred and thirteen thousand pounds sterling.

Heg. 401 (1010).—Mahmood defeated the prince of Ghoor, and annexed his country to the dominions of Ghizny.

Heg. 402 (1011).—Mahmood reduced Tahnesur, a holy city of the Hindoos, about thirty miles west of Delhi, which he plundered, broke the idols, and sent the principal idol Jugsoma, to Ghizny, to be trodden under foot. A ruby is said to have been found in one of the temples weighing four hundred and fifty miskals; a size altogether incredible.

Heg. 404 (1013).—The fort of Nindoona, situated in the mountains of Bulnat, was reduced by the king of Ghizny.

Heg. 406 (1014).—Abool Abass Mamoor, king of Khwaruzm, obtained Mahmood’s sister in marriage.

Heg. 407 (1015).—Abool Abass Mansoor fell by the hands of conspirators, but his death was revenged by his brother-in-law, who put the murderer to death.

Heg. 409 (1017).—The king of Ghizny took the fort of Mutra, in which he found immense treasures. He next invested the fort of Rajah Chundpal, which surrendered almost immediately. Having likewise defeated Chundur Ray, he returned to Ghizny loaded with spoil, with which he built a magnificent mosque, known by the name of the Celestial Bride. In its neighbourhood the king founded a university, which was supplied with a vast collection of curious books in various languages. It contained also a museum of natural curiosities. For the support of this establishment he appropriated a large sum of money, besides a sufficient fund for the maintenance of students and proper persons to instruct them in the arts and sciences.

Heg. 410 (1019).—The king of Ghizny caused an account of his exploits to be written and sent to the Caliph, who ordered it to be read to the people of Bagdad, making a great festival upon the occasion, expressive of his joy at the propagation of the faith of Islam.

Heg. 412(1021).—Mahmood defeated Nunda Ray, who had slain his ally the Rajah of Canowj, securing considerable treasure, besides four hundred and eighty elephants. His general also reduced Nardein, in which was a famous temple containing a stone with curious inscriptions, and, according to the Hindoo traditions, forty thousand years old.

Heg. 415 (1024).—Mahmood marched to Somnat, which he finally took, and destroyed the celebrated Idol, in the belly of which was discovered a quantity of diamonds, rubies, and pearls of immense value. Among the spoils of the temple was a chain of gold weighing two hundred mauns, or about four hundred pounds weight. It hung from the top of the building by a ring and supported a great bell, which called the people to worship.

Heg. 417 (1026).—Mahmood returned to Ghizny after an absence of two years and six months. This year he marched against the Juts, destroyed four thousand, and according to some eight thousand, boats. Few of the Juts escaped destruction: those who did, fell into the hands of the conqueror.

Heg. 418 (1027).—Mahmood died at Ghizny in the sixty-third year of his age. He reigned thirty-five years, and was buried by torch-light with great pomp and solemnity in the Kesr Firozy at Ghizny. This celebrated monarch was in person about the middle size, but well made, and strongly marked with the small-pox. His son Mahomed succeeded to the throne.

The Idol of Somnat.

CHAPTER I.

Shortly after the sun had risen, a beautiful Hindoo was washing her graceful limbs in the crisp waters of the sea, which gently curled over a smooth pebbly beach, a short distance from the fortifications of Somnat. This town was situated on the neck of a peninsula washed on three sides by the ocean, and fortified with great strength. There was only one approach to it. It was reported that the Ghiznivites, under Mahmood their sovereign, were on their march towards the town in large force, at which the infatuated Hindoos affected to rejoice, proclaiming in the frantic wildness of their enthusiasm, that their great idol, to whom all things upon earth were obedient, had drawn thither the Mahomedans to blast them in a moment and to avenge the destruction of the various gods of India. Upon this vain-glorious boast they appeared to rely.

The town was crowded with inhabitants who seemed determined to resist to the last gasp of life the threatened assault of their foes. Nevertheless, they trusted more to the imagined supremacy of their idol, than to their own efforts of resistance. Though the fortifications were strong for the period, when cannon were not employed in sieges, and even the battering-ram was but seldom resorted to, yet, being only of mud, they were not impregnable to the assaults of a brave and resolute foe. They were defended, moreover, by a host of fanatics, thousands of pilgrims, and crazy visionaries who crowded to worship the celebrated idols contained within their walls, forming the uncertain instruments of defence, against which the hardy and resolute troops of Ghizny, inured to warfare and accustomed to conquest, had to contend.

The inhabitants of Somnat were confident in their numbers, and this being increased by their expectation of divine interposition through the influence of their stone divinity, they hailed with derision the approach of their foes, observed their festivals with increased acclamations, as if the menaced hostility promised rather to be scenes of pastime than of devastation.

The threatened siege did not in the slightest degree interrupt the daily observances of the Hindoos. The women went to the sea-shore to bathe as usual, perfectly unapprehensive of danger from the advancing army of Mahmood.

The beach on one side of the town was very retired, and, beyond the battlements landward, flanked by a thick wood. Hither the women repaired to perform their matutinal ablutions, and being considered a spot sacred to this purpose, it was seldom or never intruded upon, except on chance occasions by the stranger.

Here, as I have already said, according to her invariable practice, about the period of sunrise, a beautiful young Hindoo mother was performing those lustrations imposed by her religion, and which, apart from any spiritual consideration, are indispensable in a tropical region. The beach sloped gradually into the sea, in which she stood up to the shoulders, her long black hair streaming like a silken fringe upon the rippling waters. Her eyes were frequently bent downward, as if in reverential abstraction, after which she would raise them to the clear blue sky, rich with the pure tints of heaven, and brightened by the fresh genial radiance of the morning sun. She was only dawning into womanhood though a mother, her age not being yet sixteen. Her child was lying on the beach wrapped in a small coverlet, and basking in the young sunlight. The babe was but a few weeks old, and the youthful mother felt for it all the yearning of a parent for her first child. She looked at it occasionally from the place where she stood, draining the water from her streaming tresses, and cleaning them with a care that showed a consciousness of their beauty, and her eye glistened with a parent’s pride as she gazed upon the earliest fruit of her wedded love.

The infant was laid upon the dry soft sand, a few yards above where the water reached at high tide. Several other women were at this moment bathing at some short distance from the young mother, who now quitted the water, having first carefully arrayed her hair, and in a short time was wrapped in that loose becoming drapery which sets off to such advantage the slender, but round and graceful forms of the Hindoo women. Her bust was enclosed in a vest of bright crimson silk, fitted closely to the shape, and covering the arm midway from the shoulder to the elbow. A long piece of fine muslin encircled her head, falling over her neck and shoulders behind, and passing the lower parts of the body in a variety of elegant undulating folds peculiar to the taste of oriental beauties. Standing a few yards from her babe, she arranged her dress with a neatness and precision which sufficiently indicated a consciousness of the becoming. She had just completed this necessary arrangement of her toilet, and was about to turn towards her tender offspring to proceed homeward, when a wolf darted from the neighbouring thicket, seized the unconscious infant, and was retiring with all speed towards the wood. The distracted mother gazed for an instant in speechless agony, but quickly recovering herself, she sprang after the beast with the swiftness of an antelope, screaming the while with an energy that made the forest re-echo her cries.

The wolf was encumbered by the weight of its burden, and the cloth in which it was wrapped trailing upon the ground, as the animal ran, greatly impeded its progress. Her companions gazed after the anxious mother, as she followed wildly in pursuit of her infant; without making the slightest effort to assist her. They stood with open mouths, but neither a sigh of sympathy escaped their bosoms, nor did even an aspiration for the bereavement of the young mother rise to their lips.

The wolf had nearly reached the thicket with its prey, and the wretched parent was about to yield herself up to the wild impulse of despair, when a horseman emerged from a path in the wood, and seeing the distress of a young and beautiful woman, the cause of which became instantly evident, he urged his steed forward, and reaching the wolf before it had time to enter the jungle, struck it on the back with his sword. The blow was given from so sinewy an arm as almost to sever the brute in twain. It immediately dropped its prey, writhed for a few moments, and died. The eager mother threw herself frantically on the body of her first-born, and began to bewail its untimely fate with piercing shrieks of loud and bitter agony. Supposing that it was dead, she clasped it to her bosom and called upon her idol to restore the joy of her life; but the stone divinity, dumb and insensible as the earth on which she had prostrated herself, heard not her lamentable cry. The huge image of Somnat, adored by millions of enthusiasts, and enriched by the perpetual offerings of wealthy devotees, standing within the walls of a gorgeous temple, which might have vied with the proudest palaces of Egypt’s kings in the brightest days of their renown, heard not the tender supplications of one of its devoted adorers, but stood in its grim majesty inaccessible to the appeal which might have melted any stone that had not been employed to fashion a divinity.

The child, feeling the pantings of its mother’s bosom, uttered a cry that in a moment subdued the mental anguish of its parent. Her lamentations ceased—she gazed upon it—unfastened the cloth in which it had been tied—examined it with an expression of excited anxiety, and finding that it was uninjured, gave a scream of joy, and clasped it with fervency to her breast.

The wolf had seized only the wrapper in which the infant had been secured, so that when released from the monster’s jaws, the babe was without a scratch. The youthful mother was wild with transport. She fixed her beaming eyes upon her preserver with a look between amazement and exultation, but without uttering a word.

By this time the stranger, beneath whose sword the wolf had died, stood near, apparently enjoying the rapture of the young Hindoo. For a few moments, he left her to the feelings in which her ardent heart was evidently revelling, forbearing to interrupt an enjoyment second only to the fruition of paradise. He beheld her beauty with fervent admiration, a beauty seldom paralleled, and heightened by the tender excitement under which she was at that moment labouring. Having recovered from the shock of agony produced by the apprehension of her child’s peril, her thoughts were now sufficiently collected to acknowledge her obligations to its deliverer. She again turned upon him her large dark liquid eyes with an expression of melting gratitude which could not be mistaken.

The stranger approached. She shrank from him, in spite of the obligation which he had placed her under, because he was of another creed. The tie of his jumma or tunic proclaimed him a Mahomedan, and she almost shuddered as he came near and bent over her. She could not smother her deeply-rooted prejudices against the enemies of her race, and the blasphemers of her gods.

“I am happy,” said the stranger, “in having been the instrument of preserving your infant from the ravening wolf. Though our creeds differ they ought at least to concur in the natural law of reciprocal benefaction. I rejoice to have saved the child of one who has been taught to look upon me, and those who profess a similar faith, as fit to hold intercourse only with the scum and off-scouring of human society, and trust that while such an act offers an appeal to your gratitude, it will convey a lesson of wisdom. I would that you should not only look upon me as the saviour of your babe, but put me on the footing in social dignity with those of your own belief in matters concerning the life which is to succeed the present, and think not that all virtue expires when not fostered by the warm atmosphere of Hindoo superstition.”

“Stranger,” replied the mother, looking tenderly upon her child, now drawing from her the maternal nutriment, “I cannot gaze upon this dear object without being sensible that, apart from all prejudices raised by those conventional laws which different creeds impose, I am your debtor for the greatest enjoyment which this world can realise. You have restored the infant to its longing mother, and whatever the restraint by which I may be repelled from welcoming the saviour of my child with those outward expressions of acknowledgment which I might be permitted to show to a member of my own faith, believe me I shall never forget that the greatest debt of my life is due to one who is considered the enemy of my country’s gods, but whom I have found to be the most signal and magnanimous of friends.”

“Perhaps the enthusiasm of your gratitude will subside when you know to whom you have been indebted for the salvation of your offspring.”

“No!—such knowledge cannot alter the fact of my obligation. I may indeed regret the spiritual and social bar which lies between us, but I never can forget the act which has restored to me a life that I value far more dearly than my own. But may I ask to whom I am indebted for such a signal act of magnanimity?”

“To Mahmood of Ghizny, the most inveterate foe of your race, who despises your gods, and is at this moment preparing to hurl your gigantic divinity, installed in yonder gorgeous temple, from its proud pedestal, and make its worshippers ashamed of having so long prostrated themselves before a block of stone.”

The lovely Hindoo shrank from her interlocutor when he declared himself to be the greatest enemy of her nation’s gods. She trembled for the moment, but her high sense of moral obligation bore down the weak fences of prejudice, and she assured him that the preserver of her child could never merge in the enemy of her race.

“Prepare,” said Mahmood, “to behold me shortly enter those walls in triumph; but be assured of your own safety, and you may yet live to know that the sovereign of Ghizny never professed a kindness which he did not rigidly perform.”

CHAPTER II.

The Hindoo mother, having made her acknowledgments to the deliverer of her child, entered the walls of Somnat, and sought her home. She related the adventure of the morning to her husband, at this time lying ill of fever. He was a man of high caste, and entertained all the prejudices of his national superstitions in an eminent degree. This tendency was aggravated to a morbid excess by his present illness. The relation greatly distressed him. The idea that his infant had been snatched from death by a worshipper of gods which his nation did not recognise, agitated him to a paroxysm of excitement. He raved, and cursed the chances that had exposed his offspring to such pollution. He would rather the wolf had devoured it, than that it should have owed its preservation to the arm of a Mussulman, and he the greatest enemy of the Hindoos and their religion.

The Hindoo father was a young man of about thirty, handsome and amiable, but a rigid observer of the national superstitions. He was affectionate to his wife, in a degree seldom equalled by Hindoo husbands, and she returned his tenderness with a pure and ardent attachment. In spite, however, of his fondness, like all husbands of his tribe he was not only a master but a tyrant. The wife was subservient to an extent that rendered her domestic life a slavery; but being impressed with a conviction that such subserviency was the proper sphere, because it was the destined lot of woman, she submitted without a murmur. Still she was relatively happy; for, by comparison with the generality of Hindoo wives, her social comforts were considerable. She felt conscious of possessing her husband’s attachment; and, though his general conduct towards her was authoritative, it was seldom harsh. Had it been otherwise than authoritative, she would have despised him as descending from the dignity of his manhood, and foregoing the especial immunities of his privileged sex.

Upon the present occasion, harassed by suffering of body and anxiety of mind, the sick man treated his young and lovely consort with a severity which he had never before exercised.

“The vengeance of Siva will be directed against this house for the folly of a woman. The god of Somnat has seen the pollution offered to the offspring of one of his worshippers. Take heed that the fiery gleam of his eye does not blast thee, when thou next offerest thy oblations at his holy shrine.” The youthful mother raised her head; the long lashes that fringed her soft but intensely bright eyes were moistened with the dew of sadness. It gathered gradually, until the weight of the liquid gem was too great a burden for the trembling lashes to support, and then trickled slowly down her clear brown cheek. She uttered not a word, but clasped her babe with greater fervour to her bosom. The husband saw her emotion, and was moved; nevertheless, he bade her quit the apartment and leave him to his repose, which, alas! came not, for the excitement had only aggravated his malady. He was scorched with fever; and, in the course of that night, his peril was imminent. The tender partner of his home and of his love did not quit his side for a moment. She saw his danger; and the gloomy thought of her own death came with the chill of a night-blast upon her soul. The awful customs of her tribe forbade that she should outlive him; and the horrible manner in which her death would be consummated seemed to freeze the very fountain of life as she thought upon it. To be cut off by the appalling process of cremation, ere the sweet fragrant blossom of existence had fairly opened into womanhood, was a sad and bitter thought. Still, the sufferings of the man she loved recalled her from these sad reflections, and she gazed upon him with an interest in which, for the moment, all her prospective sufferings were absorbed. He spoke not, but the thought of that contamination, which he supposed to have passed upon his child by the contact of one of another creed, evidently remained the paramount impression on his mind; for when the mother presented him her infant for a paternal caress, he turned from it with a shudder, and refused to allow it to be brought into his presence.

Hour after hour the tender consort watched by his side, submitting without a murmur, or even a look of dissatisfaction, to the petulance induced by his disease. She watched him as he lay upon his rug—anticipated his wishes—soothed his sufferings—prepared whatever he took with her own hand—but all her attentions seemed likely to be bestowed in vain. The full, rapidly throbbing pulse; the burning brow, the dry palm, and the brown furred tongue, upon which the cool liquid was evaporated the moment it came in contact with it, all proclaimed the jeopardy in which the invalid lay.

The native physician by whom he was attended ordered him decoctions, prepared from some lenitive herbs; these had not the slightest effect upon his disorder. When this arrived at a certain height, and the medical visitor saw that all material remedies were useless, he impressed upon the wife the necessity of immediately repairing to the temple of Somnat, and supplicating the divine intercession of its idol, promising her that her husband’s health would certainly be re-established, if she could only prevail upon the stone divinity to listen to her supplications.

“All that art can do,” said he, “I have done to restore this unhappy man, who must soon yield up his spirit to be the inhabitant of another body, unless the deity of our temple raise him up at the intercession of a pious heart. Go, and may your prayer be heard!”

This was no very encouraging expectation. The unhappy young creature now felt assured that her husband could not live, unless restored by superhuman means. The creed in which she had been reared taught her to trust in the efficacy of such means, and to believe that they would be accorded to a pious solicitation; she was therefore determined to offer her supplications in the temple, in the hope of averting her husband’s death, which, in fact, would involve her own. At this moment a Brahmin, and one of the officiating priests of the sanctuary, entered the sick man’s apartment. He was a sanctified man, with a gross, misshapen body, gross from indolence and indulgence, and bearing about him the unequivocal marks of the coarse bloated Sybarite. His shorn scalp bore not indeed the frost of age, but the deep corrugations by which the forehead was crossed showed, in characters too legible to need interpretation, that time had already prepared the furrows for the seeds of death. The old man’s countenance was haggard, though placid; but it was placid rather from insensibility, than from the access of elevated feeling. The eye was sunk beneath a projecting brow, that hid much of its expression, and its faded lustre spoke not that mute language of passion which his heart frequently prompted, but which the eye was too lustreless to betray. His legs were shrunk to the bones, and seemed scarcely able to bear the burthen of obesity which laziness and indulgence had imposed upon them. He hobbled to the couch of the dying man, looked at him for a moment, doubled his legs under him as he seated himself upon the floor, desired the cocoa-nut hookah to be brought, and, having inhaled the sedative luxury for a few moments, said, with an air of the utmost unconcern, “Thy soul is about to assume a new body; what are thy hopes?”

The invalid said faintly—“I have not lived an unholy life, and therefore hope that I shall be advanced one step towards absorption[1] into Bhrim, when my spirit throws off the vile crust by which it has been encumbered here.”

“Then you are prepared for the change—you are tired of this world?”

“No,” said the dying man with energy, “I would fain live, because there is a dark uncertainty in the future that clogs my spirit and weighs it down. It is an awful thing to die, and I would if possible escape death until age should no longer encourage a desire of life.”

“Dost thou think old men wish to die?”

“If their lives have been virtuous, why should they desire to live, when their capabilities of earthly enjoyments are past?”

“Because to them there is the same uncertainty in the future as to thee. In life there is positive enjoyment to the last; with the end of life what guarantee have we for the joys of a future existence?—they may be visionary.”

“But the blessed Vedas teach us otherwise?”

“Ay, the blessed Vedas! they cannot be gainsaid; they are the voice of the divinity: Krishna speaketh through them, but then they are the sealed oracles, which only we of the sanctuary can expound; and they promise that reliance upon the ministers of our temple will be rewarded in the metempsychosis. There is still hope of thy release from this perilous malady. Let thy wife visit the temple, and bow before the image—the deity of our race, and thou shalt have thy health return to thee.”

He continued smoking for a few moments, during which not a voice interrupted the silence. Having swallowed a large pill of opium, he rose, and taking the invalid’s wife on one side, said to her, in a low, husky whisper—“The hand of death is upon thy husband; nothing short of divine interposition can save him. If he dies, you know that his widow must accompany him to the swerga.”

“I am prepared for the sacrifice. Fear not that I shall degrade my lineage by shrinking from performing that solemn obligation which the most perfect of all religions imposes upon the bereaved widow. It is her blessed privilege; I shall not forego it.”

“But would you not willingly evade the consummation of so dreadful a sacrifice?”

“No; I would, under no consideration, evade the performance of an obligation as sacred as it is awful, and obligatory in proportion as it is sacred.”

“Nay, these are not your real sentiments; you need use no disguise with me. I can save you from the necessity of dying upon the pile, if you’ll make it worth a priest’s while to risk the peace of his own soul in that strange land of darkness or of light—who shall say which?—whither thy husband is rapidly hastening!”

“Save me! Why would you save me from a sacrifice which I deem an immunity from mortal cares? In this life, a woman’s condition is one of endurance, of slavery, of pain; I would be glad to enter upon an existence where each and all are unknown.”

“You speak indeed like a feeble woman. Do you not know that, if your body is consumed with your husband’s on the funeral pile, your soul will follow his to whatever destiny it may be appointed? This is a sad hazard, for he dies in the prime of manhood, when the blood is warm and the senses are all full of the glowing warmth of young and vigorous life. He has had no time to expiate, by penance the miscarriages of youthful years. The mellowing hand of age has not yet taught him experience, nor the penalties of indulgence wisdom. Thou art too lovely to follow him to a future doom that befits thee not.”

By this time the opium was beginning to act upon the aged debauchee, and his eyes emitted the fire, and his limbs the elasticity of youth—so potential is that debasing drug. The lovely Hindoo was shocked; but it was dangerous to offend a Brahmin. Advancing, he laid his shrivelled hand upon her shoulder, and said—“Daughter, come to the temple this night, and bring thy offerings to the idol; be assured thou shalt not want an intercessor. Think no more of burning. When thy husband dies, thou mayst yet be happy. The multitude must think that the sacrifice is performed, but trust to me, and feeble as this arm may seem, it will prove an arm of might in thy protection—it shall snatch thee from the flames.”

“Leave me,” said the unhappy wife; “one who knows her duty, and how to perform it, needs no adviser but her conscience. I shall endeavour to propitiate the divinity, by presenting my oblations before the presiding deity of our holy temple, and there lay my hopes.”

“This evening we shall meet,” said the Brahmin, as he retired with an alacrity peculiar alike to robust youth and opium.

The faithful, though unhappy wife, crept softly to her husband’s side, and gazed upon him with a glance of anxious inquiry, but spoke not, fearing to disturb him. Overcome by his exertion of talking with the Brahmin, he had fallen into a deep but disturbed sleep.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The belief of the Hindoos generally is that, after a course of progressive changes, through each of which the soul advances to a higher state of purification, it is finally absorbed into the Deity, which is, as they conceive, the perfect consummation of bliss.

CHAPTER III.

The sun went down in glory, and smiled upon its own land when it withdrew behind the ocean, as if unwilling longer to look upon the griefs with which the world that had so lately glowed with its pure vivid light was encumbered. Evening suddenly flung her shadows over the city of Somnat, but the stars sparkled in the purple concave of heaven like children of joy, imparting a beautiful relief to the grave solemnity of night.

At rather a late hour the melancholy wife quitted the side of her husband, whose malady had not abated, and repaired to the magnificent temple of Somnat, at that time the most celebrated in Hindostan. It stood upon an elevated part of the town, and covered a vast space of ground. It was a ponderous edifice, exhibiting that elaborate detail of ornament combined with massive grandeur peculiar to the early Hindoo temples. Within, it consisted of one vast aisle several hundred feet long, the roof supported on either side by magnificent columns, ornamented even to superfluity with sculpture, each column detailing an episode from the Mahabarat. Every pillar was cut from a single block of granite, elaborated with an accuracy of touch, and a justness of proportion, not exceeded by any monuments of ancient art, save those of Greece. The light was admitted through a vast dome in the centre, beneath which the huge idol stood like a Colossus, casting one unvarying expression of grim insensibility upon its prostrate but humble adorers. The figure was of stone, clumsily wrought into a monstrous form. The head was ornamented with gems of prodigious value, similar gems being likewise fixed in every pillar of the temple. Its eyes were formed of two rubies of such transcendent lustre as to inspire the worshippers with a holy awe when they prostrated themselves before this hideous image.

There were no lights used in the temple at night except one pendent lamp, the light of which being reflected from the jewels in the idol’s head, and from those fixed in the various columns that adorned the sacred edifice, spotted the whole area with a dazzling gleam which appeared the effect of superhuman agency.[2]

The most costly offerings were daily made to this factitious divinity, but the depository of its immense wealth was a secret, as the Brahmins pretended, known only to the deity to whom it had been dedicated. On two sides of the temple were various apartments occupied by the functionaries of the sanctuary, which no persons were permitted to enter, save those to whose habitation they had been especially appropriated. Strange and mysterious events were said frequently to take place within those secret and forbidden retreats, supposed to be hallowed by the holy lives of their spiritual occupants.

The Brahmin who had recently visited the invalid had an apartment near the shrine, and was one of the officiating priests in this fane of superstition, where, under the mask of religion, the most revolting abominations were nightly practised. Like the Eleusinian mysteries, they were hidden from the public eye, as only fit to be witnessed by those whom it would seem to have been thought that vice had sanctified.

With a resolved but throbbing heart the beautiful Hindoo wife entered within the black narrow portal of this gorgeous but gloomy structure. The lower part of the edifice was involved in a shadowy light which imparted a cavernous solemnity to this house of a most unholy worship. The huge idol rose amid the distance surrounded by a blaze of light that filled the dome in which the colossal image stood, but did not extend far enough to pierce the distant gloom.

As she stalked forward with a measured pace, the monstrous figures surrounding the columns seemed to glare upon her from their granite pedestals like so many petrified ogres. Her heart throbbed with emotion. The object of her visit at this dark hour of night rose to her memory with an impetuous impulse, whilst the associations of the gloom of the grave, and that of the consecrated edifice which she had now entered for the purpose of propitiating a deaf and dumb idol for the benefit of a departing soul, and to arrest the summons of death, sent a chill through the whole mass of her blood which seemed to reach and congeal the very fountain of life. When she reached the dome there was not a person but herself that she could perceive in the sanctuary. The light of the solitary lamp hanging from the centre of the dome was reflected from thousands of brilliant gems which cast a radiance around the figure of intense and dazzling brilliancy. She prostrated herself before the image, and poured the full tide of her heart’s emotions in a prayer for the restoration of her husband.

A general belief prevailed among the Hindoos of that part of the country that souls after death were summoned before the Idol of Somnat, which transported them into other bodies according to their merits in this life, where he became a sort of Hindoo Rhadamanthus, resembling that infernal justiciary, however, in nothing less than in the rigid impartiality of his justice. It was also declared by the Brahmins belonging to this celebrated temple, that the ebb and flow of the tides represented the reverence paid by the ocean to this shrine.

Having paid her devotions, the supplicant approached the base of the idol, and laid a handful of gold upon it; for her husband was wealthy, and the god of Somnat never heard a vow that was not accompanied by an offering. She prayed that her husband might be spared to her; or, if the slender thread of his destiny was already spun, that his soul might be transferred into a nobler body, and be thus advanced one step nearer to that final and beatific state of absorption so anxiously desired by all faithful Hindoos. As she concluded, there was a strange unearthly sound heard from within the image; the eyes seemed to glow with more intense brightness, and when she rose from her posture of prostration, to her surprise the aged Brahmin who had lately visited her husband stood before her. She looked upon him, however, without apprehension, feeling herself in the presence of an omnipotent agent, and not entertaining a thought, in the innocence of her pure heart, that the altar of deity could be polluted by the most licentious impurities.

“The divinity is propitiated,” said the sanctified impostor. “Your prayers have been heard, and you are favoured with the especial notice of one, in whose term of life the Maha Yug[3] is no more than a single instant, by comparison with this earth’s duration. Prepare to meet the god at midnight.”

“You mock me. Does the deity condescend to become incarnate, and reveal himself in a mortal body to his worshippers?”

“Yes: where it is his will to favour those whose homage he approves, he reveals himself to them in the likeness of his creatures, generally assuming the form of some devout priest, whose ministrations he especially approves, and thus signifies his approval. You will see him this night, under the similitude of a favourite Brahmin. He has determined to grant your supplications.”

She was astonished at this communication. The reverence in which she had been accustomed to hold the character of the priesthood—the wild solemnity of the scene around her—the dazzling light that seemed supernaturally to float over the ponderous image—the excitement under which she laboured, from her anxiety for her husband’s welfare and the issue of her appeal—the promise that her supplications had been favourably heard—all tended to throw her into such a tumult of agitation, that she became bewildered; and, under the impulse of superstitious enthusiasm, consented to meet the god at midnight.

Guileless as the mother dove, she did not dream that danger could accrue from her meeting a spiritual being who merely condescended to assume the garb of mortal flesh, in order to render himself intelligible to mortal faculties; and as, according to the impure creed in which she had been reared, gods had occasionally united themselves to mortals in an alliance of love, her heart’s purity was not shocked at the idea which the Brahmin broadly hinted, of the divinity of Somnat favouring her by such especial predilection. She was aware also that her husband, as well as herself, would look upon it as a signal mark of distinction, and feel himself honoured at his wife’s exaltation by so eminent a token of divine preference.

The wily Brahmin, however, knew his victim too well to suppose that, notwithstanding her visionary impressions, she would fall an easy prey; and it was only whilst he could keep up the delusion under which she then laboured, that he would find her a submissive votary at the shrine of the most odious superstition which has ever degraded the sacred name of religion. In order to maintain the excitement by which she was at that moment actuated, and strengthen the impressions to which she was expected to become a prey, some of those abominable mummeries were performed, so commonly practised at the altars of Hindoo gods. A number of dancing girls were introduced, who went through various obscene antics before the idol, in which several Brahmins joined, with all the apparent enthusiasm of an absorbing devotion.

The beautiful Hindoo looked on without a blush, under the persuasion that these were sacred ministrations peculiar to the divinity of Somnat, and she came to the conclusion that such were the pleasures in which that divinity delighted to revel. After these orgies had been gone through, and the temple of religion made a scene of revolting indecency, the lamp was suddenly extinguished, and the immense edifice involved in profound darkness. The young wife was confounded. She heard the laughter of those who, like the Greek bacchantes, had been performing the grossest scenes in the very presence of their deity, and shouts of joy seemed to issue from a thousand throats. She stood mute, between astonishment and apprehension. Her awe had given way to momentary terror. She was preparing to retreat toward the portal through which she had entered, when a soft but repulsive voice caught her ear:

“Come to the embrace of the god; he awaits thee; ’tis midnight, and he is impatient to meet thee.”

Her heart palpitated; she was struck with a sudden suspicion. The voice was evidently disguised, but, to her quick ear, could not be mistaken: it was that of the Brahmin. Her brain flashed with instant conviction, as if the deity had lighted up her soul with a positive revelation. The impulse was irresistible. The illusions of superstition vanished, and she felt herself in the meshes of the betrayer. She gasped for breath; she spoke not; she groped for a resting-place, and her arm fell upon the pedestal of the idol.

“Come,” said the voice, in a gentle whisper; “why this delay? The god is impatient, and he is not used to be slighted: where he honours, he expects obedience. Come!”

“Avaunt! deceiver,” she cried. “You have marked me for your victim. I am betrayed. Why should the divinity of Somnat assume the form of an aged and deformed Brahmin, when he might clothe himself in the fairest garb of mortal flesh? My dream is past. I am your dupe. Away, and leave me. Never will I submit to pollution by one who makes religion a pander to his odious passions. A light has broken upon me. The deity has indeed heard my supplication, and saved me from the machinations of one who will swell the ranks of the Asuras, amid the darkness of Lóhángáráká.”[4]

The Brahmin, finding himself foiled, quitted his expected victim in a fury of disappointment.

She stood alone, leaning on the image, rapt in a trance of painful abstraction. Suddenly she felt the idol totter; a noise was heard from within, like the hissing of ten thousand serpents, immediately after which fire issued from the nose and mouth of the image, and fell in thick showers around. The whole temple was illuminated, and the door instantly became visible to the worshipper. She darted forward in spite of every impediment, and at length succeeded in gaining the entrance. She felt the pure breath of heaven upon her burning brow, and rejoiced in her escape. Reaching her home at length, in a tumult of hope and anxiety, she found that her husband had gone to that land where “there is time no longer.”

FOOTNOTES:

[2] This is stated in the Zein-ool-Maasir.

[3] The Maha Yug, or great Divine Age, is the longest of the Hindoo astronomical periods, containing a cycle of four million three hundred and twenty thousand years.

[4] The last of the thrice seven hells of the Hindoos. Lóhángáráká signifies hot iron coals.

CHAPTER IV.

Immediate communication was made to the relations of the defunct, that the deity of Somnat had heard the prayers of his relict, and he that was transported to a higher region, to be subjected to a change in the course of his transmigration that would bring him nearer to the final bliss of absorption into the universal Bhrim. The various connexions of the deceased were all summoned, and the neighbourhood immediately resounded with cries of lamentation, and those frantic ululations invariably heard at Hindoo funerals. The women stood screaming over the body with dishevelled hair, beating their breasts and rolling themselves upon the floor like so many wild beasts, whilst the disconsolate widow sat apart, abstracted by the thoughts of her own approaching sacrifice. She moved not; her eye was fixed on the ground, but the fountains of her grief were dry. Not a tear came to her relief—not a sigh escaped her bosom. The one awful image of death, in its most appalling form, absorbed her whole mind.

The Brahmin, before spoken of, appeared to officiate upon this melancholy occasion. He whispered in the widow’s ear words of consolation and hope, but she heard him not. He talked of her rescue from the fiery death about to be prepared for her; she disregarded him, and turned from the aged sensualist with an expression of disgust. His eyes gleamed in their hollow sockets with a deep leaden glare, and the blood rushed a moment to his flaccid cheek. He turned from his anticipated victim to proceed with the obsequies. When everything had been provided, the spiritual functionary, having previously bathed, took a narrow slip of a certain herb, and binding it round one of the fingers of the deceased, sprinkled upon the floor a quantity of lustral water, obtained from the sacred river,[5] a libation to the gods, whom he invoked with numerous prostrations, and a variety of wild gestures. The people assembled joined in a prayer for the future repose of their relative’s soul.

When this part of the ceremony had been performed, in the strictest manner prescribed by their formularies, fire was brought from the temple, where it had been purposely kindled, and certain herbs, consecrated to this solemn purpose, were disposed near the body in four different places. Some relatives of the deceased cast into the fire a quantity of dried cow-dung pulverized. During this portion of the preparatory rites, the officiating Brahmin was occupied in prayer, but paused in the midst of his orison, to perform an essential part of the funeral solemnities. A cow, adorned with flowers, was introduced at this auspicious juncture, and presented to the minister to prevent the defunct from being unhappy in his mutation, which the venerable hierophant promised, without any reservation, that he should not be, in consequence of the Brahmin’s prayers. Several offerings of a different kind, but no less valuable, were made to this disinterested priest before the obsequies were completed.

The ceremony of the Prayatchitam, or expiation of sins, was next performed. It consisted of prayers, after which the soul of the deceased was evoked, and certain astrological calculations made respecting the constellation under which he expired.

The body was now washed. On the forehead was marked the sigh of the caste, with a compost of ochre, fine clay, and oil; it was then arrayed in the funeral robe, and a piece of areka-nut forced into its mouth. A small fillet of linen was next torn into strips over the face; with those strips the two thumbs were tied, and the corpse being rubbed with a piece of sandal-wood, which emits a very strong and fragrant odour, was laid upon a palankeen covered with red cloth, the Hindoo pall, and ornamented with flowers.

A large aperture was now made in the wall of the house, which had no second story, and through this the body was conveyed in a sitting posture to the pile, the aperture being closed up the moment the corpse had been carried through.

When the procession had reached the gate of the court fronting the house, it was preceded by two men nearly naked, bearing each a long trumpet, the mournful sound of which, as dissonant as it was loud, blended with the noise of tomtoms, finger-drums, cymbals, and various other noisy instruments, produced a din sufficient to scare the living into the condition of the dead. To this portentous clamour the numerous relatives of the deceased united their wild wailings, more like the baying of dogs than the lamentations of rational beings. Some cried, others screamed and tore their hair, whilst several sang the praises of the defunct in a hoarse monotonous chant. The dress of these energetic mourners consisted simply of a single piece of cloth wrapped round their bodies, hanging from the head to the knees.

When the procession reached its destination, the palankeen was placed upon the ground, four furrows were traced towards the four cardinal points and oblations of gengeli and rice were offered to those aerial spirits supposed to inhabit the mansions of the dead, in order to propitiate their goodwill.

The nose of the defunct was now pinched, to ascertain if there remained any signs of life; for the Hindoos suppose that the dead may be resuscitated, though no such fact is recorded by their fabricators of marvels. Water was next poured upon the head of the corpse, and the noise of tomtoms and trumpets was redoubled, to awaken the dead man should he happen to be in a trance. It being at length ascertained that the spirit had quitted, and not returned to the insensate clay, the body was again placed on the palankeen and carried close to the spot intended for the funeral pile, the immediate vicinity having been first purified with Gangetic water, and cleared of every particle of dirt supposed to convey defilement. This portion of the ceremony was accompanied with numerous prayers and prostrations.

All these forms having been scrupulously observed, the corpse was placed upon a stone always erected near the Chodelet, which is the place appointed for cremation of the deceased. This stone represents Aritchandren, a virtuous king, who, becoming slave to the chief of the Pariahs, was employed by his master to take care of the Chodelet, and receive the taxes to be paid on burning the dead. After various fantastic mummeries and vociferous supplications, some pieces of copper money were buried before Aritchandren, together with a small bit of new cloth and a handful of rice, by way of a burial fee. One of the Pariahs, whose office it was to look after the fire, then approached the stone, and informed Aritchandren,[6] that, having received the regular tribute, he must permit the body to pass. The palankeen was now sent back, the hair and nails of the defunct were carefully cut, and the funeral pile was prepared. Branches of the sandal tree were made use of for this purpose, it being imagined by all pious Hindoos that this tree has more virtue than any other, save the mango, in promoting the happiness of the deceased, both being trees consecrated to their gods. Branches of the ficus religiosa and of the banian tree are occasionally used, but only by those who cannot afford to purchase the more costly wood of the rarer trees.

The pile being at length prepared, the corpse was placed upon it. The nearest relation performed this melancholy office, and prepared the last repast for the dead. In order that the departed might go into the other world with sufficient food for his journey, butter, rice, and curds were put into the hands, mouth, and ears of the corpse.

Thus ended this part of the ceremony.[7] It was a long and tiresome process, but nothing could divert those engaged in it from performing the minutest thing prescribed in their formulary. On the morning of the Hindoo’s death, alarm had been spread through the town of the approach of Mahmood’s army, which report was shortly after confirmed by his investing the fort with thirty thousand men. This did not in the slightest degree interrupt the obsequies. Not a creature present seemed to bestow a thought upon the danger of being threatened by a large besieging army, headed by a great prince and a successful warrior. They relied upon the protection of their idol, which they imagined could blast the enemy with the lightning of its wrath, and rescue them from the threatened peril. They heard the din of battle while engaged in performing the funeral rites, but it diverted them not from their solemn purpose. The name of Mahmood the victorious was shouted without the walls, and re-echoed within them with a general acclamation of defiance. Thousands of unarmed fanatics crowded the ramparts, confident of divine interposition, and loaded the air with curses upon the followers of a new faith.

During the performance of the funeral rites, the beautiful widow had remained apart, absorbed in the solemn intensity of her own thoughts. The death of a husband whom she tenderly loved shook her heart with a severe pang, and the thought of the awful sacrifice which his death imposed upon her dilated her bosom with a deep and palpable terror; still she resolved to die. With her the high sense of duty was paramount over every selfish consideration, and she braced her resolution to undergo one of the most fearful sacrifices which the madness of bigotry has imposed upon the credulity of devout but imbecile minds.

The body of her husband was already upon the fatal pyre, and all things were ready for her to consummate that act of devotion, which, as she had been taught to believe, should secure her an eternal communion with her consort in paradise. The Brahmin approached her to announce that she was waited for. He advanced towards her alone, and bade her be of good cheer.

“Thou shalt not perish,” he cried; “trust to me and I will save thee, to reap the harvest of joy in an earthly paradise, before you ascend to one of brighter promise indeed, but of more remote certainty.”

“What mean you? My doom is fixed. I must join my husband upon the funeral pile, that our souls may ascend together to that sphere which his spirit is destined to enter.”

“But would you not rather evade this fiery death?”

“Why should I? Is it not imposed upon us by a wise and immutable will?—how then can I evade it?”

“Would you rather live?”

“Not if it be my duty to die.”

“You are not bound to perish unless you desire it. The deity will absolve you from the obligation upon certain conditions.”

“What are they?”

“That you will reward with your love his vicegerent here, whose ministration he has approved, and to whom he has imparted superhuman power, as the reward of a life of faithful homage. I will bear you to a retreat where no sorrow shall visit you, and where every moment of your life shall be gilded with a blessing.”

“Mocker!—this is no time for delusion: bear me to the pyre, and you shall see how a Hindoo widow can die.”

“But why would you court death, when happiness is within your grasp!”

“Because death with a beloved husband were a blessed boon compared with life with an aged and sensual Brahmin. Priest, I despise thee:—lead me to the pyre.”

The Brahmin was silent. He folded his arms, and fixed upon her a look of deep and implacable malice.

“I fear thee not,” she cried, rising; “conduct me to my doom; the gods will applaud what their priest may scorn; but I reverence the one and despise the other.” She beckoned to her women, who approached, and declared to them that she was ready to ascend the pyre, upon which her husband’s body had been already some time laid. The ministering priest did not utter a word, and made ready to commence the initiatory ceremonies.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] The Ganges.

[6] The Greek Charon and this Hindoo toll-taker would appear to be identical; but the Greeks have been indebted to Hindoo superstition for many other notions, the parallels of which are too strong to be mistaken.

[7] See Sonnerat, vol. ii., on Hindoo funerals.

CHAPTER V.

The unhappy widow now prepared herself to perform the dreadful sacrifice which was to free her from the cares of this world and exalt her to the Swerga bowers, or Hindoo paradise. She was stationed before the door of the house of mourning in a kind of rostrum, which was profusely and extravagantly ornamented; tomtoms, trumpets, and cymbals continuing their deafening clangour as before. She placed a small piece of areka-nut between her almost motionless lips and softly aspirated the name of Somnat’s idol. She next adorned her head, neck, and arms with all her jewels, arraying herself in sumptuous apparel, as if about to appear at the marriage ceremony, instead of a funeral solemnity.

The array of her person being concluded, she proceeded toward the place of sacrifice, accompanied by numerous friends, to the sound of those instruments which had already preceded the procession of her husband’s body. Several Brahmins, including the hierophant, walked by her side encouraging her with assurances that she was going to enjoy eternal felicity in regions where there is no misery known, and where she would become the sita[8] of some god who would espouse her as a reward for her constancy and virtue. They further promised her that her name should be celebrated throughout the earth, and sung in all their future sacrifices. This proves a strong stimulus to some women, who go to the pile voluntarily, and with an enthusiasm truly astonishing; for there is no legal obligation to perform the suttee.

A cup was now handed to the unhappy victim of the most barbarous superstition that has ever stained the black annals of fanaticism. She drank of it without the slightest emotion. In a few minutes the effects of this draught were visible. Her eyes glistened; she erected her frame to the full height of her stature, and looked around her with a flushed cheek and stern severity of purpose which sufficiently showed that the fever of enthusiasm was beginning to circulate rapidly through her veins. As the aged Brahmin approached her, she looked at him with a glance of defiant scorn, and pointing to the pile on which the corpse of her husband had been laid, said, with a raised brow and flashing eye—

“Dost thou think I would escape that fiery passage to everlasting repose? Thou wouldst withhold me from my glory. My soul shall ascend on wings of flame to the abodes of those who never die. I see the beckoning spirit in yonder cloud waiting to bear mine to its eternal home. Thou wouldst tear me from my bliss. Away, away!”

She immediately grew calm and began to prepare for the sacrifice with a truly sublime solemnity. Her relations came to her, with an alacrity that showed how gratified they felt at the oblation she was about to offer. The place was surrounded by an immense concourse, upon whom the victim occasionally cast a glance of pity mixed with triumph at the approaching consummation of her destiny. The music, if such it might be termed, had ceased while the preliminaries of the sacrifice were taking place, and an intense and awful silence reigned among the assembled multitude.

The beautiful widow now advanced to the foot of the pyre, prepared to consume that exquisite frame in the early freshness of its blossoming youth. The Brahmins crowded round her, endeavouring to sustain her fortitude to endure the coming trial by songs in which they artfully introduced the most fulsome eulogies of her heroism. This appeared to elevate her courage amid the awful array of death. It was now announced to her that the fatal moment had arrived when the flames were to embrace one of the most perfect bodies that Nature had ever moulded. She did not quail at the summons. Her eye dilated, her nostrils expanded, her lips parted, and her whole countenance was lighted up with a sublime energy of expression that recorded, with the mute but soul-stirring voice of an oracle, the deep and solemn purpose which engrossed her soul. She stood a few moments as if in prayer. Her babe was brought and placed within the arms of a once yearning mother. The feelings of nature revived. She spoke not, but pressed it tenderly to her bosom. Tears streamed down her cheeks in a flood, still not a feature quivered. The palpitations of her heart were perceptible under the slight muslin drapery that covered her bosom. It heaved beneath the suppressed throes of her emotion, but the countenance betrayed not the internal struggle. Her tears gradually ceased to flow. Her eye cleared and resumed its former expression of solemn determination, and she waved her hand as a signal that she was ready.

Two Brahmins now advanced with lighted torches. Having fervently kissed her infant, she placed it in the arms of an attendant, and it was instantly removed from her sight. At this moment her nearest relations approached; to these she bade a tender adieu. Having distributed her jewels among them, she embraced them severally, when they retired and left her alone with the ministers of death.

Not a breath stirred among the multitude as she prepared to ascend the pile. Hundreds stood agape with awe at witnessing the solemn spectacle. Having performed certain preliminary rites, a signal was given by the chief Brahmin, when she raised her dark but bloodless brow towards heaven, sprang upon the pile, embraced her husband’s corpse, and in a few moments was enveloped in flames and smoke, which hid her from the sight of those who had assembled to behold this dreadful sacrifice.

No sooner was the fire kindled than the notes of innumerable instruments were heard, shouts and acclamations rent the air, in order to prevent the sufferer’s screams of agony being heard. Ghee was poured upon the burning pyre to accelerate the horrible process of destruction, and the flames raged with such fury that in a short time not a vestige remained but the ashes of the dead. The crowd then quietly dispersed, rejoicing at having witnessed so acceptable a holocaust.

While this dreadful act of superstition was performing, the town of Somnat was in a state of siege; still the turbid stream of fanaticism was not diverted from its course. When the Mahomedans invested Somnat, the citizens had flocked from all parts and crowded the ramparts to repel the enemy; but so soon as they saw their formidable array, the discipline of their troops, and the fearless manner in which they rushed to the assault, the astonished Hindoos, alarmed for their own safety, thronged to the temple by hundreds, prostrating themselves before their favourite idol, and supplicating deliverance from their foes. Many, drowned in tears, vowed to perform sundry dreadful penances in case the Mahomedans were repelled from their walls; but the idol returned no answer to their petitions.

Mahmood, perceiving the ramparts almost deserted, ordered his troops to advance to the walls and apply the scaling-ladders, which was instantly done; and they commenced to mount the ramparts, shouting aloud “Allah Akbar!” God is great! Those Hindoos who remained upon the battlements, offered a spirited resistance. With the wild energy of despair they rushed upon the Mahomedan soldiers as they ascended, and threw them headlong from the ladders. Hearing the noise of the assault, and the enemy’s war-cry, those citizens who had quitted the walls in order to propitiate their divinity by prayer, returned to the ramparts in vast numbers, and opposed themselves to the besiegers. These latter, no longer able to retain their footing, wearied with their exertions, and dispirited by such unexpected opposition, fell back on all sides, and were at length obliged to retire.

Next morning the action was renewed with no better success, for as fast as the besiegers scaled the walls they were cast down backward by the besieged, who now gaining confidence from the advantage obtained on the preceding day, resolved to defend their city to the last. They imagined that the divinity who presided over Somnat had heard their prayers, and would not permit their foes to triumph over them; and under this impression they fought with a resolution that bore down all opposition. They poured into the temple after the repulse of their enemies with offerings to their idol, which were of course accepted, to their great joy and that of the divinity’s ministers, who undertook to dispose of those offerings in a manner worthy of the liberality of the devotees who presented them.

Mahmood was perplexed beyond measure at the disastrous issue of the siege. He saw his army daily diminishing in an undertaking upon which he had set his heart. He determined however to accomplish his object, or perish before the walls of Somnat.

For some days he made no attempt against the town, but remained quiet, in order to restore the confidence of his troops, which had been greatly shaken by the unsuccessful issue of the late assault.

Their success against the beseigers had greatly elated the citizens, and they began to despise the foe which they had so much dreaded. In order to show his contempt for the Mahomedans, a devotee let himself down by a rope from the rampart, and advancing towards the enemy’s camp, stood before the king’s tent, braving Mahmood with his late failure, and prophesying that every Mahomedan would be blasted by the breath of Somnat’s idol before the rising of another sun. He was at first looked upon as a madman, but some of Mahmood’s soldiers being at length incensed at his audacity, seized him, and brought him before their sovereign. Upon being asked why he had quitted the town, he replied he came to warn them that they would be all swept from the face of the earth by the vengeance of a god who would not spare them for their attempt to profane his holy shrine.

“I come to defy you,—to show how impotent you are to impose injury upon anyone claiming especial protection of the divinity worshipped by all pious Hindoos. You are all under the ban of our idol. You are doomed to destruction. I go to prepare the scourge that shall sweep you from the face of this globe.”

“You will never return,” said Mahmood, “to accomplish your contemplated plan of retribution; but I will show yonder fanatics how little reliance is to be placed upon the god of an idolator. What say you to hanging in the sight of your city’s battlements?”

“You dare not provoke the vengeance of an enemy which has already convinced you of its might. I despise your threats—I fear not hanging—death has no terrors for me—violence towards one whose penances have purified his spirit for a higher gradation of existence in another life, will only bring the curse of retribution upon you, while to me it secures blessings which you will never have an opportunity of enjoying.”

“Soldiers,” said Mahmood to some of his military attendants, “hang that madman upon the nearest tree.”

The Hindoo smiled as he heard the order given.

“My death will be avenged,” said he, “though you send me to Paradise. You may deprive me of life, but you cannot withhold from me the power of defying and scorning the race of Islam.”

At a signal from their sovereign, several soldiers seized the fanatic, and hung him upon a tree within sight of the ramparts. The man died uttering expressions of triumph at his martyrdom. He was seen from the walls by his countrymen, who imprecated curses upon the heads of his murderers. The body was cut down as soon as life was extinguished, the head severed from the trunk, and flung over the battlements of Somnat. The citizens bore it to their temple in triumph.

FOOTNOTES:

[8] Bride.

CHAPTER VI.

When the Hindoo widow ascended the pile, the straw by which it was surrounded was immediately ignited, and having been previously wetted in a slight degree, a smoke was raised which enveloped the whole fabric, and completely concealed the victim from view. She was wrapped in a holy trance, and it was some moments therefore before she became sensible that the fire had not reached her. To her surprise she felt herself gradually sinking amid a gloom so cavernous that the first idea which flashed upon her mind was that death had done its work upon her body, and that she was descending into those regions of everlasting darkness where the wicked expiate their crimes in this world by unmitigated and eternal penalties. She, however, perceived that the dead body of her husband was still beside her, and this restored her to consciousness. In a few moments the descent of the platform was arrested; she was suddenly seized and lifted from it; the frame instantly rising with the corpse, which was consumed without the horrible sacrifice of a living body.

The widow was confounded at her situation. The effects of that stimulating potion which she had taken to sustain her through the awful rite about to be consummated, had subsided, and she trembled at the apprehended terrors in store for her. She was encompassed by a gloom so profound that she could not distinguish a single object. She heard not a sound, save a breathing almost close to her ear, which satisfied her of the juxtaposition of some living being. She did not stir, but endeavoured to collect her scattered thoughts. Her natural energy of character overcame the more violent impulse of alarm, and in a calm, collected tone, she said, “Why am I thus torn from the embrace of my dead husband, with whom I was about to proceed to the bowers of Paradise?”

No answer was returned to her inquiry. She heard only the shouts of the multitude above, who were exulting at her imagined immolation, with the frantic transports of demons loosed from their eternal prisons, to wander awhile in the freedom of crime beyond the confines of their own dreary habitations.

After some time, hearing no sound near her, not even of a respiration, save her own, she began to grope around. The intensity of the darkness had somewhat subsided, and her eye had become sufficiently familiar with it to be enabled to obtain a dim perception of objects. She proceeded cautiously forward until her progress was arrested by a wall. Following the course of the masonry she perceived that she was in a small circular chamber, from which there was a passage through a low, narrow portal. The floor of the apartment consisted of earth, covered with dried cow-dung, which was perceptible to her as she trod the chamber with naked feet, having cast off her sandals before she ascended the funeral pile. She had already strung her mind to the necessary climax of determination which had enabled her to brave death in its most horrid form, and was consequently not terrified at the idea of dying under circumstances less appalling.

She was on the floor, her mind filled with images of death, when suddenly a light was seen approaching through the dark passage opposite to which she happened to be lying, and a bright figure, enveloped in light, appeared to enter the portal. Every part of the figure was illumined; and yet the light did not appear to radiate from it, for all around was darkness. It was about the size of a man, and exactly resembled the huge idol of Somnat. The widow started to her feet as the singular object approached. It advanced to the centre of the apartment, and remained stationary.

The phosphorescent figure, instead of illuminating the apartment, seemed to attract to itself every particle of light, rendering the gloom around it so intense that nothing else was visible. It glared upon the astonished widow from eyes fixed in their sockets, like diamonds riveted into the living rock, with a lustre so unearthly that she was obliged to seek relief in the darkness from a sight of the hideous phantom. She drooped her head and remained in a state of agonizing suspense as to the issue of this terrifying visitation. She began to question her vitality. And yet the strong perception of her senses—the tangible evidence of life in her own movements—the hearing of her own breath—the feeling of her heart’s pulsation—all convinced her that she was alive. Could this be a visit from the idol as promised by the Brahmin? She would judge by the issue. And yet could the deity have rescued her from the performance of an oblation universally held by all devout Hindoos to be so welcome to him? Can he abrogate his own laws. The thing appeared impossible. By whom then had she been rescued from death?

In spite of the natural tendency of her mind to superstition, a secret misgiving occasionally invaded it that she was about to become the dupe of some spiritual juggle. The overtures of the Brahmin recurred to her mind, and the anxiety he had expressed to save her from performing the suttee. She began to dread that she was in his power; and yet the strange supernatural shape at this moment before her seemed strong evidence that she was in the presence of something unearthly.

Several female figures, all of the same lustrous description, as if radiant with their own inherent glories, next appeared to enter the vault, and surround the representative of Somnat’s Idol. They prostrated themselves before it, and then such an exhibition of indecency was represented as caused the widow to turn with a feeling of sickening disgust towards the wall in order to exclude from her sight the revolting objects. The blood mantled to her very temples: it was now manifest to her reason that she could not be in the presence of her god, but that she had been made a dupe of the basest artifices. She had no difficulty in suspecting the author of her present imprisonment.

Whilst these thoughts were passing rapidly through her mind, her ear caught a voice which, though feigned to imitate something superhuman, she instantly recognised as that of the Brahmin, towards whom she entertained sentiments of unqualified disgust.

“The deity of Somnat visits thee with his especial predilection. Thou most favoured of thy sex, hail the coming of the god with joy, and receive him to thy embrace.” A hand was laid upon her arm; she shrank from the touch as if it had been the contact of a torpedo.

“Man of infamy,” she said calmly, “I am not to be deceived either by your wiles or by your sorceries. Scenes to which you would invite me but ill become the purity of heaven, where they alone abide who are free from carnal defilements. When the ministers of religion convert her sacred temple into a place of revelry and unchaste joys, the words of spiritual blessing can no longer proceed from such polluted lips. A light seems to have broken upon my soul, and to have imparted to it a new sense of perception. I know not how, or why the revelation has come upon me, but I feel that I have been a dupe—that your religion is a scandal—that by you the deity is vilified, his altars defiled, and his temple desecrated—that I am betrayed, and that you are a villain.”

No answer was returned. She heard footsteps slowly retreating, and fancied she could distinguish the dim outline of a figure through the gloom. The silence and mysterious conduct of her persecutor surprised her. She feared to quit the cell, knowing not whither the passage might lead, and determined to perish in her present solitary prison rather than consent to anything which her heart did not sanction.

Beginning to feel drowsy from the effects of the draught which she had taken before ascending the pile, and fearful lest, if she allowed herself to be overcome by sleep, some base advantage might be taken of her, she paced the vault rapidly in order to dissipate the effects of the narcotic, the influence of which had not entirely subsided. In a short time some one again entered the apartment, and the same voice informed her that a curry had been prepared, and a jar of Gangetic water provided for her neither of which she felt any inclination to touch. It occurred to her that the food might contain some treacherous drug; she therefore determined not to taste it.

Her heart now reverted to her infant with all a mother’s longing. When she thought of its being in the hands of comparative strangers, who could not feel towards it a parent’s tenderness, her anxiety became vehement. It was her only tie upon earth, and the big tear filled her eye as she reflected that she had probably beheld it for the last time. Having at length walked off the effects of the potion, the excitement of her mind dispelled all desire to sleep, and she seated herself upon the floor of her gloomy apartment, determined to wait with patience the issue of her odious captivity.

She was not long allowed to enjoy the solitary quiet of her own thoughts. This was soon interrupted by a strange sound like the roaring of flames within a narrow flue, and shortly after the vault was filled with a pale dusky light which gave a horrible aspect to everything around. It illumined the chamber, which she now perceived was a small circular cavern, with a domed roof, in the centre of which was a square aperture that passed upward beyond the reach of the eye, emitting no light, and through this it was clear that she had been lowered immediately after she ascended the pyre.

The sudden glare which had succeeded to the intense darkness, produced such an oppression upon the sight that she was obliged to close her eyes for several moments. When she opened them, a scene was presented to her view, which, though it excited her terrors, could not subdue her constancy. The chamber appeared filled with shapes of the most horrible description; these approached her, and standing by her side, seemed to deride her with demoniacal ferocity. She heard no sound, but the objects presented to her view were appalling. She saw women in every conceivable state of mutilation, writhing under the infliction of demons, who grinned with ferocious delight at the agonized contortions of their victims. Creatures of monstrous form and lineament with hideous countenances rushed towards her, threatening torments too horrible to describe.

One figure, representing a sort of hippogriff, armed with a weapon of torture, from which branched a great number of barbs, was seen standing over a prostrate female, into whose bare bosom he continually thrust the instrument, while she appeared to be convulsed with agony beneath the frightful infliction. Upon the head of this monster was a square tablet of Palmyra leaf, on which was traced in fiery characters, “Such is the doom of those who despise the favours of Somnat’s god.”

The sight of this object recalled the widow’s terrors. The conviction instantly came that she beheld a mere juggle, and her alarm at once subsided. What she saw might be the effect of sorcery, but it was clear to her that the farce was got up in order to terrify her into a participation of guilt, at which her pure soul revolted. The voice of the odious Brahmin recurred to her recollection, and the illusion at once vanished.

She determined to perish rather than become the willing dupe of a being, the thought of whom inspired her with ineffable abhorrence. Gazing calmly at the mummery, which after a while subsided, she was again left in darkness and to the welcome solitude of her own reflections. It was indeed a relief, for the continual excitement to which she had been exposed rendered quiet a luxury, even amid the impenetrable gloom of a dungeon.

CHAPTER VII.

Although Mahmood had been so severely foiled in his attempts upon the city of Somnat, still he resolved not to abandon the enterprise. Their success in repelling the besiegers had elevated the courage of the Hindoos to the highest pitch of enthusiasm. They persuaded themselves that the power of their idol had been exerted in favour of his worshippers, and that their enemies would perish to a man. Several fanatics singly quitted the fort, to cast defiance in the enemy’s teeth, and brave death, which the Mahomedan sovereign inflicted upon them, with undaunted resolution worthy of a better cause. They appeared to glory in their martyrdom, as scarcely an hour had passed, since the first repulse of the besiegers, in which these executions had not taken place in sight of the ramparts.

The Hindoos, confiding in their numbers, and in the protection of their idol, determined upon a sally, which, with the blind fury of zealots, they made about noon, under the glare of an intensely ardent sun, reflected with augmented ardour from the high battlements of their city upon the adjacent plain, on which the Moslems were encamped. On a sudden the gates were opened, and out poured a multitude of ill-armed and undisciplined troops bent upon slaughter. They rushed forward, shouting like maniacs, but were embarrassed by their numbers. They did not appear to have calculated upon the regular and steady discipline of their enemies, who had been inured to warfare, and accustomed to conquer, under the conduct of their warlike monarch, but expected to overwhelm them by the mere force of numbers, backed by the potent aid of their stone god.

Mahmood drew up his troops behind the tents, which broke the furious onset of his foes, and enabled him to attack them in separate bodies. The first rush of the Hindoos was checked by the steady valour of the besiegers, who scattered destruction among their ranks, and in a short time the plain was strewed with the dying and the dead. The Hindoos did not continue the struggle; they were quickly repulsed. A rout followed, which ended in a tumultuous flight. They were pursued to their very walls by the Moslems, but the gates were closed, both against the pursued and their pursuers.

The idolaters from the ramparts beheld the rout of their troops with dismay. They pressed again into the temple, prostrated themselves before their idol, made piaculary offerings, and supplicated his aid to chastise the murderers of his true worshippers. The deity was deaf to their entreaties. Shouts of the victors and cries of the vanquished were wafted by the gentle breeze to the sanctuary, but its stony idol was unmoved. They repaired again to the ramparts, expecting that the Ghiznivites, flushed with success, would storm the city. The frantic Hindoos, however, were determined to defend their walls to the death. They saw the enemy rushing forward; they heard their shouts of triumph; the scaling ladders were already applied, when unexpected succour was seen advancing along the distant plain. It was an army of their countrymen, marching to the relief of Somnat. Arriving before the Ghiznian camp, they presented themselves in order of battle. Mahmood, determined to frustrate this attempt to reinforce the garrison, recalled his troops from the pursuit, and, having left a portion of his army to keep the garrison in check, advanced with the remainder towards the Hindoo forces. These were fresh, having performed but a short and leisurely march, while the Mahomedans were fatigued with their late exertions, and flushed with the excitement of victory, which rendered them too confiding and careless. They, moreover, entertained a contemptible idea of their enemies, and thus gave them an advantage, of which the latter did not fail to avail themselves.

The Hindoo army was composed of troops very different from those fanatics who had hitherto defended the walls of Somnat, being chiefly formed of regularly-trained soldiers, who had frequently been opposed to the Moslem arms. Mahmood, heading his victorious Ghiznivites, pressed forward to the attack with an impetuosity that caused the enemy to recoil, but quickly rallying, they maintained their ground with a resolution that astonished the Mahomedans, and rendered the victory doubtful. The battle raged with great fury, yet neither party gave way. For a long time the balance of advantage did not appear to vibrate in favour of either. The idolaters, looking upon the struggle from the battlements of their city, cheered their countrymen with loud acclamations, at the same time invoking their idol to cast the foes of their country and of their religion into the sea. Women were seen upon the walls, holding up their infants to infuse new energy into those troops which had marched to raise the siege of their beloved city.

Among the Hindoo forces were some Rajpoots, who fought with a desperation which nothing could resist; and if the whole army had been composed of these, it would more than probably have turned the scale of victory against the Moslems. They were, however, cut off to a man. The Hindoos at length began to waver, but fresh troops coming to their assistance, the struggle was still maintained on both sides with desperate determination. The shouts from the battlements seemed to inspire the Indian army with unwonted resolution, while it depressed the energies of their enemies. At length, however, by a vigorous onset, the Mahomedans caused the foe to vibrate. Mahmood, seeing his advantage, ordered his troops to advance and complete the rout, when his ardour was checked by the arrival of new enemies. Two Indian princes joined their countrymen, with considerable reinforcements, and the battle raged with renewed fury.

The Mahomedans began now to waver in their turn. The Hindoos being inspired with fresh courage advanced to the charge with an impetuosity which caused the Ghiznivites to recoil; Mahmood, at this moment perceiving his troops about to retreat, leaped from his horse, and prostrating himself raised his eyes to heaven, and in an attitude of the humblest supplication implored the divine aid. Then mounting his horse, he took his principal general by the hand, by way of encouraging him and the troops under his command, and advanced on the enemy. The solemnity of his manner and of the act which he had just performed filled the soldiers with holy fervour. They expected that the prayer of their sovereign, so piously offered, would be heard, and gazed upon him with the enthusiasm of men determined to conquer or perish. As he advanced he cheered them with such energy that, ashamed to abandon their king, with whom they had so often fought and bled, and who had always led them on to conquest, they with one accord gave a loud shout and rushed forward. In this charge, made with an impetuosity which nothing could resist, the Moslems broke through the enemy’s line, and fighting with that confidence which this advantage inspired, soon left five thousand of their foes dead upon the field. The rout became general, and the vanquished Hindoos fled on all sides.

The garrison of Somnat beholding the defeat of their companions gave themselves up to despair, abandoned the defence of the city, and issuing from the gate to the number of several thousand embarked in boats, intending to proceed to the island of Serindip, the modern Ceylon. This attempt, however, was frustrated by the vigilance of the king, who having secured several boats left in a neighbouring creek, manned them with rowers, together with a detachment of his best troops, and pursued the fugitives, on which occasion he took some and sank others of their flotilla, so that very few escaped.

Having now placed guards round the walls, and at the gates, Mahmood entered Somnat, accompanied by his sons, a few of his nobles and principal attendants. He found the city entirely deserted by the troops, but there remained within the walls an almost infinite number of pilgrims and devotees, who were in the daily habit of offering their devotions before the celebrated idol. Many of the inhabitants were persons of great wealth, upon whom the Mahomedan king did not hesitate to levy such contributions as the conquerors of earlier times never failed to impose upon the rich who happened to be among the vanquished.

Mahmood had not forgotten the beautiful Hindoo widow whose infant he had rescued from the wolf; and one of his first objects upon entering the city was to ascertain the place of her abode. He soon learned that she had followed her husband to that unknown land which can only be reached through the dark valley of the shadow of death. He was deeply affected. Her beauty had excited his admiration. The scene in which he had become with her so principal an actor had left a deep impression on his mind, and a tear rose to his eye as he heard the sad tidings of her death. He demanded to see the child. It was brought before him. He took it in his arms, in spite of the horror with which its rigid guardians looked upon the profane act. The infant smiled in his face, as if it recognised the obligation which it was under to him. It put its little hand upon his cheek. He was moved. The stern but generous warrior felt his heart swell. Giving it to an attendant—

“This shall be the child of my adoption,” he said. “It is indebted to me for its life, and I shall take upon me the direction of its future destiny.”

The relatives were amazed. They expostulated; they imprecated the vengeance of their god upon the unsanctified mortal who should dare turn from his faith the son of a Hindoo. Mahmood smiled at their objurgations, and dismissed them, but retained the infant.

He commanded to be brought before him the Brahmins who had urged the widow to commit herself to the flames, and had been present at the odious sacrifice. All answered the summons except the chief who officiated upon that melancholy occasion. He was nowhere to be found. The conqueror sternly inquired why they had induced the widow to consummate such an act of infernal superstition.

“Because,” said the elder among them, “it was our duty to secure her soul a place in Paradise, rather than suffer it to be doomed to everlasting penalties, by failing to perform that solemn oblation which the god of the Hindoos requires of all pious widows.”