Page:History of India Vol 3.djvu/107

 RAZIYA, A WOMAN ON THE THKONE 77 his money upon singers and buffoons and worse, and swaying drunk upon his elephant through the bazars showered red gold upon the admiring crowd. " God forgive him/' says the chronicler of his time, " sen- suality, frivolity, and the company of the lewd and base bring an empire to ruin." His mother, a Turkish slave, managed the government while her son wantoned, till her savage cruelty caused a general revolt. The pair were imprisoned, and Firoz died after a nominal reign SILVER COIV OF ALTAMISH. of not quite seven months. His sister Raziyat-ad-din (" Devoted to the Faith ") was chosen in his place. She was the only child after her father's heart. " Sul- tana Raziya," says the same chronicler, who knew her, " was a great monarch: wise, just, generous, a bene- factor to her realm, a dispenser of equity, the protector of her people, and leader of her armies; she had all kingly qualities except sex, and this exception made all her virtues of no effect in the eyes of men, God's benison upon her! ' Altamish had perceived her great qualities, trusted her with power, and named her his heir. When the astonished ministers remonstrated against the unprecedented idea of setting a woman on a Moslem throne, he said, " My sons are given over