Page:Akbar and the Rise of the Mughal Empire.djvu/201

194 the Nizám. With him, but subordinate to him, was associated an administrative financial officer called the Diwán, or Chancellor.

Akbar was a very magnificent sovereign. Though simple in his habits, he recognised, as the greatest of British Viceroys recognised after him, that show is a main element in the governing of an Eastern people. It is necessary to strike the eye, to let the subjects see the very majesty of power, the 'pomp and circumstance' attending the being whose nod indicates authority, who is to them the personified concentration on earth of the attributes of the Almighty. This is no mere idea. The very expressions used by the natives of India at the present day show how this thought runs through their imaginations. To them the man in authority, the supreme wielder of power, sits in the place of God. His fiat means to them weal or woe, happiness or misery. On days of ceremony, then, they expect that this all-powerful being shall display the ensigns of royalty, shall surround himself with the pomp and glitter which betoken state. Akbar thoroughly understood this and acted accordingly.

We are not left to the descriptions of the author of the Ain to realise the imposing grandeur of his ceremonies. The native historians speak of his five thousand elephants, his twelve thousand riding-horses, his camp-equipage containing splendid tents, comprising halls for public receptions, apartments for feasting, galleries for exercise, chambers for retirement, all of splendid material and rich and varied