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164 the Marathas. The majority of the vanquished armies naturally joined them, and adopted the calling of the road. The local officials set themselves up as petty sovereigns, and gave the brigands support, as the party most likely to promote a golden age of plunder. Thus the bulk of the population of the two dissolved states went to swell the power of Sambhaji and his highlanders, and the disastrous results of this revolution in Deccan politics were felt for more than a century.

At first, indeed, Aurangzib's armies seemed to carry all before them, and the work of taking possession of the whole territory of the vanished kingdoms, even as far south as Mysore, was swiftly accomplished. Sivaji's brother was hemmed in at Tanjore, and the Marathas were everywhere driven away to their mountain forts. To crown these successes, Sambhaji was captured by some enterprising Moghuls at a moment of careless self-indulgence. Brought before Aurangzib, he displayed his talents for vituperation and blasphemy to such a degree that he was put to death with circumstances of exceptional barbarity in 1689. The brigands were awed for a while by the commanding personality and irresistible force of the Great Moghul. He had accomplished a military occupation, not merely of the Deccan, but of the whole peninsula, save the extreme point south of Trichinopoly and the marginal possessions of the Portuguese and other foreigners. Military occupation, however, was not enough, and he determined to make the southern provinces an integral part of his settled empire, as finally and organically a member of it as the