Page:Akbar and the Rise of the Mughal Empire.djvu/99

92 various races who inhabited the peninsula, each ruling on the principle of temporary superiority, each falling as soon as a greater power presented itself, had not only introduced a conviction of the ephemeral character of the successive dynasties, and of the actual dynasty for the time being. It had also left scattered all over the country, from Bengal to Gujarát, a number of pretenders, offshoots of families which had reigned, every one of whom regarded the Mughal as being only a temporary occupant of the supreme seat of power, to be replaced, as fortune might direct, possibly by one of themselves, possibly by a new invader. This conviction of the ephemeral character of the actual rule was increased by the recollection of the case with which Humáyún had been overthrown. Defeated at Kanauj, he had quitted India leaving not a trace of the thirteen years of Mughal sway, not a single root in the soil.

These were facts which Akbar had recognised. The problem, to his mind, was how to act so as to efface from the minds of princes and people these recollections; to conquer that he might unite; to introduce, as he conquered, principles so acceptable to all classes, to the prince as well as to the peasant, that they should combine to regard him as the protecting father, the unit necessary to ward off from them evil, the assurer to them of the exercise of their immemorial rights and privileges, the assertor of the right of the ablest, independently of his religion, or his caste, or his nationality, to exercise command under