Page:Akbar and the Rise of the Mughal Empire.djvu/190

Rh the predominance of the Mughal. The union was further cemented by the marriage, already referred to, between Prince Salím and a daughter of Bhagwán Dás. What the real influence of Akbar's administration was upon that chivalrous race may be gathered from the short summary which Colonel Tod, himself, more Rájpút in his sympathies than the Rájpúts themselves, devotes to his career.

'Akbar,' writes that author, 'was the real founder of the empire of the Mughals, the first successful conqueror of Rájpút independence. To this end his virtues were powerful auxiliaries, as by his skill in the analysis of the mind and its readiest stimulant to action, he was enabled to gild the chains with which he bound them. To these they became familiarised by habit, especially when the throne exerted its power in acts gratifying to national vanity, or even in ministering to the more ignoble passions.' Unable, apparently, to comprehend the principle which underlay the whole policy of Akbar, that of conquering that he might produce union, and regarding him as he rightly regarded his Afghán and Pathán predecessors, Colonel Tod attacks him for his conquests. Yet even Colonel Tod is forced to add: 'He finally succeeded in healing the wounds his ambition had inflicted, and received from millions that meed of praise which no other of his race ever obtained.' I need not add that if to render happiness to millions is one of the first objects of kingship, and if to obtain that end union has to be cemented by conquest, the means sanction