On Thursday, May to, the Emperor entered Agra, and took up his residence at Sultan Ibrahim's palace. It was the hottest season of the year, and Baber's followers began to long for their cool mountain homes. " Many men dropped down and died on the spot." The inhabitants in terror fled before them, " so that we could not find grain nor provender either for ourselves or for our horses. The villagers, out of hostility and hatred to us, had taken to rebellion, thieving and robbery. The roads became impassable." All these evils made his best men lose heart. They objected to re maining in Hindustan, and even began to make preparations for their return, but Baber was determined to found a Tatar empire in India. As soon as he heard of the murmurings among his troops he summoned a council of his nobles.
" I told them that empire and conquest could not be acquired without the materials and means of war : That royalty and nobility could not exist without subjects and dependent provinces : That, by the labour of many years after undergoing great hardships, measuring many a toil some journey, and raising various armies ; after exposing myself and my troops to circumstances of great danger, to battle and bloodshed, by the Divine favour I had routed my formidable enemy, and achieved the conquest of the numerous provinces and kingdoms which we at present held : ' And now what force compels, and that hardship obliges us, without any visible cause, after having worn out our life in accomplishing the desired achievement, to abandon and fly from our conquests, and to retreat back to Kabul with every symptom of disappointment and discomfiture ? Let not any one who calls himself my friend ever henceforward make such a proposal. But if there is any among you who cannot bring himself to stay or to give up his purpose of returning back, let him depart.' " Saber was speedily rewarded for his heroic firmness. " It was no sooner known," says Erskine, "that his in vasion was not to be a temporary inroad, like those of Mahmtid of Ghaznae and the Great Taimur, but that he was to remain permanently in the country and govern it on the spot, than new fears and new hopes began to operate both on the natives and the Afghans. His generous policy, his manly deportment and known valour inspired his friends with confidence, and struck terror into his enemies." The consequence was soon visible. The Afghan chieftains were reduced to obedience. The decisive battle of Khanwa, near Biana 1 (March, 1527), and the storming of the great Hindu stronghold Chanderi on the south-east of Malwa, destroyed all hope of there ever being again a Rajpoot Empire. Three years after Panipat, Baber had brought Behar and Bengal under his sway. This is the last campaign of which we have the history from his own pen, and of the military events of the next fifteen months we hardly know anything. The silence of his diary was no doubt due to the decline in his health, which had become evident to all around him. The grave illness of his son Humayun, whose cultivated mind and sprightly wit rendered him especially dear to his father, was a mortal blow. The native historians inform us how Humayun was brought to Agra stricken unto death, and Baber, seated one day in his palace overlooking the Jumna, exclaimed that of all things his life was what was dearest to Humayun, as Humayun was to him ; that his life, therefore, he cheerfully devoted as a sacrifice for his son's, and prayed the Most High to vouchsafe to accept it. " The noblemen around him entreated him to retract the rash vow, and, in place of his first offering, to give the diamond taken at Agra, and reckoned the most valuable on earth ; that the ancient sages had said that it was the dearest of our possessions alone that was to be offered to Heaven. But he persisted in his resolution, declaring that no stone, of whatever value, could be put in competition with his life. He three times walked round the dying prince, a solemnity similar to that used in sacrifices and heave-offerings, and, retiring, prayed earnestly to God. After some time he was heard to ex claim, ' I have borne it away.' " The Muhammadan historians declare that the son daily grew better while the father daily grew worse. Baber soon after died in his palace near Agra on December 26, 153o. He was only forty-eight, yet one of the most illustrious sove reigns that ever filled a throne. Erskine's portrait of him is worthy to rank with any in Clarendon's stately record : " His character was happily compounded of most of the qualities that go to form a great prince and a good man. He was bold, enterprising, full of ardour, and possessed of the com manding talents that sway and lead the mind of man. His temper was frank, confiding and gay, and maintained through life the freshness of youth. He had strong affections, the warmest of domestic feelings, was devotedly attached to his relations and friends, and ready to sympathize with the pleasures and the sufferings of human beings of every class. Keenly alive to
whatever was grand and beautiful, he cultivated knowledge of every kind with unwearied assiduity and with proportional success. Glory in every shape inflamed his imagination, and he attained a rare eminence of power and renown. Yet no man's success could be more entirely his own." Three days after the Emperor's death, Humayun as scended the throne, and during the brief intervals when there was not so much a state of tranquillity as a suspension of arms between the hostile monarchs, Agra was more often the royal city than Delhi. It was the post from which the Emperor took the field in his various campaigns against the Afghans, who still possessed vast estates and considerable power throughout India and were ready on the first signal to fly to arms. The Empire which the great Baber estab lished required to be sustained by the firm and dexterous hand of the founder. Humayun had his father's quick intellect and his personal courage, but his mind was naturally indolent, and he never commanded the esteem of his subjects. After nine years of discord and confusion his army was dis persed and his camp taken at Kanaug by Shir Khan, an Afghan of great ability, caution, and enterprise.' Humayun fled from Agra to Lahore, and for five years Shir Shah, who had previously ruled Bengal and Bahar, reigned over Hindu stan. He made Agra his headquarters, and is said to have built a palace within the walls of the old fort. On May 24, 1645, while conducting the siege of the fort of Kalinjer, the key of Bandelkand, he was dreadfully burnt by the explosion of a tumbrel. " In spite of the excruciating pain which he suffered, he had fortitude enough to walk to the trenches, and directed that the accident should be concealed from his troops. Here he remained, and as from time to time new storming parties advanced to the assault, he cheered them on with his voice, issued occasional orders with astonishing composure, and sent away such of his officers as came about him, to join the action. The attack was continued with un remitted vigour. As the cry to evening prayers was heard, news were brought to the King that the fort had fallen. ' Thanks be to Almighty God,' he said, and quietly expired." The Sur dynasty, which rose by the genius of Shir Khan, and was sustained by the talents of his son Selim, fell by the ignorance and vice of their successors. In 1555 Humayun returned to India, obtained a complete victory over Sikandra Shah and the Afghans at Sirhend, and once more ascended the musnud at Delhi. Agra surrendered without any resis tance. After having arranged affairs in the Imperial city, he was about to proceed there, when, as he was descending some steps, his foot slipped and he fell headlong to the bot tom. He was carried into his palace, where, after lingering for four days, he expired, on January 24, 1556. Humayun was succeeded by his son, Jalal-ud-din (the glory of the faith) Muhammad, called Akbar the Great, and few monarchs have so well deserved the title by which he is known in history. At his accession to the crown he was a little over thirteen, but he had been already trained in the rough school of war, and he possessed those qualities which Englishmen admire—good temper, vast muscular strength, and un flinching courage. Among mountaineers remarkable for their feats of strength and bodily activity few outdid him in their national pastimes. He was fond of sport, and took a special delight in hunting the royal tiger and capturing herds of wild elephants. Three years after his accession Akbar took up his residence in Agra and, pleased with its situation on the banks of the Jumna, " the waters of which has few rivals for lightness and taste," and, incited by its strategic position, he determined to make it the seat of his empire. The brick walls of the old citadel were fast crumb ling away, and Akbar ordered his Lord High Admiral (Kasim Khan) to build on the same site a new fort at Fut tehpore. A multitude of labours urged the conclusion of the work, but eight years passed before the stupendous fortress was completed. The strong and lofty walls of red sand stone, which glisten like jasper in the rays of an Indian sun, are a mile and a half in circuit, and all that could adorn the dignity of an Imperial residence, or contribute to the comfort or pleasure of its numerous inhabitants, were contained within them. The shape has been likened to a crescent and a triangle, with its base stretching for half a mile along the river bank on the east. The other two sides are almost of equal lengths, and at the angles are massive projecting bastions. On the north, towards the city, is the Delhi Gate, a massive pile flanked by two enormous octagonal towers of red sandstone, inlaid with white marble, and crowned by two domes.