Page:History of Aurangzib (based on original sources) Vol 1.djvu/378

348 long silence, only confirmed his suspicion that

Shah Jahan had lost his control and that affairs at Court had taken a new turn. Therefore, he made up his mind, and started from Bidar on 18th October, 1657.

Immediately there was the greatest rejoicing in the Deccani kingdoms. Here were the Mughals abandoning their late conquests as untenable! In vain did Aurangzib try to put a bold face on the matter; in vain did he write to Qutb Shah: "The retreat of my army was due to a wish to reassure the people of Bijapur who were frightened by its presence and had abandoned the cultivation of their lands, and also because I had got news that my Begam's illness had increased." The plea was too palpably false to be believed. While his vanquished enemies were raising their heads in the South, and a storm was brewing against him in the North, Aurangzib received one of the severest domestic shocks: the day after leaving

Bidar he learnt that his principal wife