the same night in a vision, and foretold his violent death, which came to pass as already related in this chapter. So ended this singular invasion, and Islám was in abeyance in Oudh for one hundred and sixty years, until the conquests of Shaháb-ud-dín Ghori, in 1193 A.D., enabled him to place Kutb-ud-din Aibak as his representative on the throne of Delhi.

It was probably about the middle of the thirteenth century that the present Dargáh of Syad Salár was built. It was visited about 1340 A.D. by Sultán Muhammad Toghlak, after his suppression of the revolt of Ain-ul-Mulk, and is still the scene of a large annual fair held on the first Sunday in Jeth. Mas'úd is said by tradition to have condescended, while at Satrikh, to take to himself as wife the daughter of a converted Teli, or oilman, who dwelt at Radauli, in what is now the Barabanki district, and on the great day of the fair-said to be the anniversary of the martyr's marriage as well as his death a representative of his wife's family regularly arrives from Radauli, with a bridal couch and other offerings for the use of his shade. The Dargáh is a massive, battlemented building, in the centre of which stands the tomb itself, inside a dark and narrow cell, entered by a single door some five feet high. Till a year or two ago, there was no other means of ventilation, and as into this cell the pilgrims crush together all day long in successive batches of as many as a vigilant police, armed with knotted handkerchiefs to drive back the crowd, and assisted by barricades, will admit, the state of the atmosphere towards the close of a hot day in May may be more easily imagined than described. Some eight or nine years ago more than twenty people were crushed and suffocated to death, after which police supervision somewhat mitigated the crowding, but was powerless perceptibly to improve the vitiated atmosphere. Recently, however, an energetic Deputy Commissioner, among other "modern touches here and there," which redeem the shrine, if not from "nothingness," at least from annihilation of its worshippers, has succeeded in getting a window opened in the wall of the holy of holies, the application to which of a thermantidote considerably cools and purifies the heated

horrors of the atmosphere within. The curious part of the matter is that though the khádims, or servants of the shrine, vehemently objected to this innovation before it was made, the pilgrims have quite accepted the beláti pankha as part of the sacred apparatus, and call the current of air which proceeds from it the breath of the martyred saint. They have even begun to place on it offerings of pice, cowries, and flowers; and in two or three years time these will doubtless form a recognised source of income to the khádims, and be mortgaged, fought over, and sued for, with as much earnestness as if the origin of the tribute were lost in the mists of antiquity.

The fair itself is essentially a poor man's fair, and is attended by low-caste Hindús quite as largely as by Muhammadans. This is a curious illustration of the laxity of Hindú religious conceptions, considering that the one object of Salár Mas'úd's life was the destruction of their faith and the slaughter of its adherents. This anomaly is noticed in Sleeman's "Tour in Oudh," and is there explained on the theory that thinking Hindús regard the invader as having been an instrument of divine vengeance, to whom power was given over them for their sins; while the ignorant masses hold "that the old man must still have a good deal of interest in heaven, which he may be induced to exercise in their favour by suitable offerings and personal applications to his shrine." It is, perhaps, a more probable explanation that the Hindu worshippers believe themselves, in some confused way, to be adoring, not so much Syad Salár, as the old Sun god, whose image, Bálarukh, has been already mentioned. It is, at any rate, certain that they speak of the personage whom they come, as they put it, to interview, as "Bála Bádshah," or "" King Bála"; and it is not easy to see how, except by some such confusion as this, the name should have come to be applied to the Musalmán hero and Ghází.

The crescentade of Salár Mas'úd has been dwelt on at what may seem undue length, mainly because it was the first impact of Islám on Oudh, and has left more traces, and is known in fuller detail, than any subsequent invasion; partly,

also, to be perfectly candid, because its scenes are more familiar to the writer. Its hold on the popular imagination is testified to by the fact that "the Musalmáns of Oudh are apt to associate with Syad Salár every object or tradition of antiquity to which they can ascribe no certain origin."

It is a somewhat humiliating confession, but it is probably a true one, that of the history of Oudh, from the time of Syad Salár's expedition to the appointment of S'ádat Khán as Súbahdár of the province in 1720 A.D., a period of nearly seven hundred years, we have next to no real information. Written Hindú records there are almost none, and from Muhammadan chronicles little can be gleaned beyond such unfruitful items as that this governor was superseded by that, or that the infidels of such a place revolted, and were put down with great slaughter. Local Hindú traditions there are in abundance, but it seems almost impossible to connect them with any degree of certainty with such facts as are to be gathered from the Muhammadan historians. Thus we learn from the latter that in 1226 A.D. Malik Nasírud-din was appointed as governor of Oudh, and "overthrew the accursed Bartúh (Bhars?), under whose hands and swords more than one hundred and twenty thousand Musalmáns had received martyrdom"; all of which was, no doubt, very vivid and real to him, and to the poor Bartúh, whoever they were, but is not quite so much so to us. In 1243 A.D. the Emperor Alá-ud-din sent his uncle Nasír-ud-dín as governor of Bahraich, where he" devoted himself to peaceful pursuits, and the improvement of the condition of his subjects In that country and in the hills he fought many battles against the infidels. Under his kind rule Bahraich attained great prosperity." This Nasír-ud-din afterwards became Emperor, and it was he who again defeated the Bhars under the brothers Dál and Bál, as already related, in 1246 A.D. Or perhaps these two defeats of the Bhars may be really one and the same, and a confusion of twenty years have crept into the chronology. Or, again, the victory which is spoken of as if it followed immediately on his appointment as governor, may not in reality have occurred till twenty years after that event, when he had become Emperor.

Oudh and Bahraich were evidently two distinct governments or fiefs. The latter, including Gonda, seems to have been always held singly, owing doubtless to its isolated position, cut off from the rest of the province by a great unfordable river. The former was sometimes held jointly with Karra, sometimes with Badaun, and sometimes with Zafarábád.

It would be easy to accumulate such items as these, were it worth while to do so. But as mere isolated events they are useless. They might serve as landmarks, if we were in possession of general information as to the movement of society and popular life in Oudh. Taken by themselves, they are as worthless as would be an assortment of milestones in the absence of a passable road on which to erect them. Local details of the fortunes of particular families are plentiful enough, but scarcely any generalisations wide enough to be entitled to a place in a provincial history can be arrived at. It must suffice to say that for about a century and a half after the conquests of Shaháb-ud-dín Ghori, though Musalmán influence in Upper India was steadily becoming consolidated, yet Musalmán settlements in Oudh were few and insignificant. But from about the year 1350 A.D. the tide of Muhammadan immigration set steadily in, and continued with short intervals until nearly the middle of the eighteenth century. The course which it followed lay chiefly from the north-west to the south-east of the province, and formed a broad belt running through Harduí, Lucknow, Bárabanki, and Faizábád. In Unáo, Sítapur, and Sultanpur, the Musalmán colonies wese less numerous and sporadic; while in Kheri, Bahraich, and Gonda to the north, and Rai Bareli and Pratábgarh to the south, they were few and

isolated.

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CHAPTER IV.

THE NAWABI [1720-1856].

THE wheel of fortune was whirling at the very top of its speed in Upper India during the early part of the last century. Adventurer after adventurer rose like bubbles to the surface of the seething cauldron, floated there for a moment, and then vanished into an obscurity from which, in most cases, they had no apparent claim to have arisen. Some few, of tougher texture or more favourably environed than the rest, contrived to keep themselves with more or less permanence at the top of affairs. One of the most distinguished of these was S'ádat Khán, founder of the modern dynasty of Oudh. His original name was Muhammad Amín, and he came of a noble Syad family which derived its descent from the Prophet himself through the Imám Músa Kázim, and had long been settled at Naishapur in Khorásán. He was described by Alexander Dow as "the infamous son of a yet more infamous Persian pedlar," but this vigorous language may perhaps be to some extent explained by the fact that S'ádat Khán's grandson Shúja'-ud-daulah had refused to grant certain salt contracts to the historian who used it. Mirza Nasír, father of Muhammad Amín, had been in the service of the Emperor Bahadur Sháh, second son of Aurangzíb, and on the news of his death, Muhammad Amín, in his