Instead Of Following This Advice, Mujate
Returned To Badur And Prostrated Himself At His Feet, Delivering Up His
Scymeter With These Words, "If I Have Deserved Death From You, I Here
Present You The Traitor And The Instrument Of His Punishment.
Kill me,
therefore, that I may have the honour of dying by your hand:
Yet the
faithful services of my grandfather, father, and self, have merited a
better reward." Badur, struck with his fidelity and attachment, received
him again to favour; but turned his rage against Melek Tocam for
revealing the secret orders with which he had been entrusted, and sent
Mustapha Rume Khan to Diu to put him to death. Malek Tocam got notice of
this at a country house in which he occasionally resided, whence he fled
from Rume Khan. After this Badur came to Diu which he reduced, having
arrived there at the same time with Nuno de Cuna, when the interview
between the governor and him was proposed; but which Badur only intended
as a feint to ward off the danger which he apprehended from the padishah
of the Moguls; meaning, if he could patch up an agreement with that
sovereign, to break with the Portuguese. But the Mogul recalled his
ambassadors and commenced war upon Bader, of which hereafter.
Those whom we name Moguls call themselves Zagetai, in the same manner
as the Spaniards call themselves Goths. Zagetai is the name of the
province which they inhabited in Great Tartary near Turkestan, and the
nobles do not permit themselves to be called Moguls. According to the
Persians, the Moguls are descended of Magog the grandson of Noah, from
whom they received the worship of the one only God. Wandering through
many provinces, this nation established themselves in Mogalia or
Mongolia, otherwise Mogostan, called Paropamissus by Ptolemy. At
this time they extend farther, and border upon the kingdom of Horacam
or Chorassan, called Aria, or Here by that ancient geographer.
From the extreme north, the Moguls extend to the river Geum or
Jihon, which runs through Bohara or Bucharia, the ancient
Bactria, so named from its capital, the celebrated seat of learning
from the time of Zoroaster, and where Avicenna acquired the
knowledge which made him so famous. Bucharia, or Bactria borders
upon Quiximir or Cashmire and Mount Caucasus, which divides India
from the provinces of Tartary in the north. This kingdom of the Moguls
now reaches to the mountainous regions of Parveti and Bagous which
they call Angou [199]. As in this dominion there ace great mountains,
so there are likewise very large and fruitful plains, watered by five
rivers which compose the Indus. These are the Bet, Satinague, Chanao,
Rave, and Rea[200]. The cities of this country are numerous and, the
men courageous.
[Footnote 199: De Faria becomes here unintelligible, unless he here
means the range of mountains which bound Hindostan, particularly on the
north-west, including Cashmir and Cabul; which seems probable as
immediately followed in the text by the Punjab, or country on the
five rivers composing the Indus. - E.]
[Footnote 200: These rivers are so strangely perverted in their
orthography as hardly to be recognisable, and some of them not at all.
The true Punjab or five rivers is entirely on the east of the Indus,
Sinde or Nilab. Its five rivers are the Behut or Hydaspes, Chunab or
Acesinas, Rauvee or Hydraotes, Setlege or Hesudrus, and a tributary
stream of the last named the Hyphasis by the ancients. These two last
are the Beyah and Setlege of the moderns. The Kameh and Comul run into
the Indus to the west of the Punjab - E.]
The Moguls are of the Mahometan religion, using the Turkish and Persian
languages. They are of fair complexions, and well made, but have, small
eyes like the Tartars and Chinese. Their nobility wear rich and gay
clothes, fashioned like those of the Persians, and have long beards.
Their military dress is very costly, their arms being splendidly gilt
and highly polished, and they are singularly expert in the use of the
bow. In battle they are brave and well disciplined and use artillery.
Their padishah is treated with wonderful majesty, seldom making his
appearance in public, and has a guard of 2000 horse, which is changed
quarterly. Both Moguls and Patans endeavoured to conquer India; but by
treachery and the event of war, the Patans and the kingdom of Delhi were
reduced by the Moguls at the time when Baber, the great-grandson of the
great Tamerlane was their padishah.
At the period to which we have now proceeded in our history of the
Portuguese in India, Omaum or Humayun, the son of Baber, was
padishah of the Moguls, and declared war against Badur king of Guzerat;
who immediately sent an army of 20,000 horse and a vast multitude of
foot to ravage the frontiers of the enemy. Ingratitude never escapes
unpunished, as was exemplified on this occasion. Crementii queen of
Chitore, who had formerly saved the life of Badur, and who in return
had deprived her of the kingdom of Chitore, was required by him to send
her son with all the men he could raise to assist him in the war against
Humayun. The queen required he would restore her other son, whom he kept
as an hostage, that she might not be deprived of both, and in the mean
time raised all the forces she was able. Not aware of her intentions,
Badur sent her son to Chitore, on which she immediately put herself
under the protection of Humayun. Badur immediately drew together an army
of 100,000 horse, 415,000 foot, 1000 cannon, 600 armed elephants, and
6000 carriages, with which he besieged Chitore, and battered its walls
with great fury. While engaged in this siege, he received information
that the army he had sent to ravage the country of the Moguls had been
defeated with the loss of 20,000 men. He at length got possession of
Chitore by policy more than force, after losing 15,000 men during the
siege; but the queen made her escape with all her family and wealth.
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