Page:History of India Vol 5.djvu/342

 288 AKBAR'S RELIGIOUS VIEWS that physicians had represented the flesh of kine to be productive of sundry kinds of sickness and to be difficult to digest. Fire-worshippers also came from Nausari in Gu- jarat, proclaiming the religion of Zardusht [Zoroaster] as the true one and asserting that reverence to fire is superior to every other kind of worship. They at- tracted the king's regard and taught him the peculiar terms, ordinances, rites, and ceremonies of the ancient Persians; so that at last he directed that the sacred fire should be made over to the charge of Abu-1-Fazl, and that, according to the fashion of the Kings of Iran, in whose temples blazed perpetual fines, he should take care that it was never extinguished either by night or day for that it is one of the emblems of God and one light from among the many lights of His creation. From his earliest youth, in compliment to his wives, the daughters of the Rajas of Hind, Akbar had, within the female apartments, continued to burn the liom, which is a ceremony derived from fire-worship; but on the New Year festival of the twenty-fifth year after his accession (987 A. H., 1579 A. D.) he prostrated himself both before the sun and before the fire in public, and in the evening the whole court were required to rise up respectfully when the lamps and candles were lighted. On the .festival of the eighth day after the sun's entrance into Virgo in this year, Akbar came forth to t the public audience-chamber with his forehead marked like a Hindu and with jewelled strings tied on his wrist by Brahmans as a blessing. The chiefs and nobles