Page:Aurangzíb and the Decay of the Mughal Empire.djvu/152

Rh time when these important successes were completed. As has been soon, he was appointed to this, his first official post, on the 10th of May, 1636, when in his eighteenth year. The war was practically over before he arrived on the scene, and all he had to do was to receive the last representative of the Nizám dynasty, and send him to join others of his kindred in the fortress of Gwaliór. The province of the Deccan at this time is described as containing sixty-four forts, fifty-three of which were in the hills, and it was divided into four provinees – Daulatábád, including Ahmadnagar, its old capital; Telingana; Khándésh; and Berár (capital, Elichpúr). The revenue of the whole was reckoned at five crores, or more than five and a half million pounds. The only addition made during Aurangzíb's first government was the reduction of the territory of Baglána, between Khándésh and the Western Gháts, to the position of a tributary State in the winter of 1637-8. In June, 1643, the Viceroy adopted the profession of a fakír, and was deprived of his office.

Twelve years passed before Aurangzíb returned to the Deccan. The campaigns in Afghánistán had diverted his energies, and the interval had passed peacefully in the south. Sháh-Jahán's officers wore busily employed in completing the revenue survey of the Deccan provinces, and the kings of Bíjápúr and Golkonda were quite content to let well alone, so long as the Mughals observed the same maxim. They paid their tribute, as a rule, and in return only asked to be