Page:England & Russia in Central Asia,Vol-I.djvu/235

215 THE TUECOMANS. 215

About the same year that Aga Mahomed was dealing out well-merited punishment to the Turcomans of Astrabad, their kinsmen of Merv were being hard pressed by the ruler of Bokhara, Mourad Shah, or Beggee Jan, as Sir John Malcolm calls him, who had over-run a considerable portion of Central Asia, and had warned the Persians of Khorasan that unless they turned Sunnis he would return and proceed to convert them after a summary fashion. In this campaign he had indeed laid siege to the town of Meshed, but finding that town stronger than he had anticipated, and being unwilling to admit his inability to capture it, he informed his soldiers that the holy Imaum Reza, who was buried in Meshed, had appeared to him in a dream and forbidden him to prosecute the siege any further. The story goes that the daily supplications to the Imaum by the distressed inhabitants deprived that sacred personage of sleep, and that when Mourad learnt this, he said, "I know that the Imaum liveth, and he shall not have to reproach me with disturbing his rest.'* The career of this Bokharan ruler was so remarkable that some sketch of it here may prove interesting. Shah Mourad, or Beggee Jan, was the eldest son of the Ameer Daniel, who had established himself upon the throne of Bokhara at the expense of its legitimate ruler, Abdul Grhazi Khan. When he died he left Mourad his heir. But Mourad had many brothers and other relations, all of whom aspired to the chief place ; and there was no doubt that if he put forward his own claims he would have to compete with several formid-