Page:Mádhava Ráo Sindhia and the Hindu Reconquest of India.djvu/19

Rh wealth and a military monarchy; where the king was assisted by Bráhman counsellors, and the rural Communes sent the flower of their young men to serve in a more or less embodied militia. These peasant warriors were despised by the arrogant and luxurious Muhammadans, both for their lack of pomp and splendour, and for something business-like and unchivalrous in their manner of fighting. But those were the very qualities which led to the first successes of the people of Maháráshtra when the Musalmán power ran to seed. Could the Mughals have stayed their own degeneracy, and at the same time could they have employed the Maráthás as the Cossacks and Uhlans of their unwieldy armies, they might have used them with irresistible effect in the conquest of the Deccan; and might, possibly, have succeeded in the scheme, in itself not unreasonable, of consolidating the whole peninsula of India into one Empire.

But Dîs aliter visum; and when the great but mistaken attempt of the Emperor ‘Alamgír, commonly known as Aurangzeb, had ended in disaster, the destruction of the southern Musalmán kingdoms only swept a clear field for the Maráthá enterprise. Then they found the opportunity for which they had been so long waiting: they adopted wider aims, and a more imposing style; adding to their direct possessions while they extended their indirect sway and influence in every direction. As this extension proceeded they organised their habits of levying contribution on the subjects of other States. At last their system of