Page:History of Aurangzib (based on original sources) Vol 1.djvu/323

CHAP. XII, on 7th April, 1656, and Ali Mardan Khan, the premier peer, on 16th April, 1657. And, as the giants of old passed away, the Emperor found no worthy successors to them among the new faces and younger men about him. He had already completed 67 lunar years, and the life of warfare and hardship that he had gone through in his father's latter years, followed by the long ease of his own tranquil reign, had undermined his body, and he already felt the hand of age. What would happen after him ?

That was the question now present in all minds. Often and often had he talked with his confidants about the future, and that future was most gloomy.

Shah Jahan had four sons. All of them were past youth, and all had gained experience as governors of provinces and commanders of armies. But there was no brotherly love among them, though the three younger princes,—Shuja, Aurangzib and Murad Bakhsh, were usually drawn together by a common jealousy of the