Page:Shivaji and His Times.djvu/91

1659] agility, — Jiv Mahala, an expert swordsman, and Shambhuji Kavji, the murderer of Hanumant Rao More. Each of them carried two swords and a shield.

As the party was about to descend from the fort a saintly female figure appeared in their midst. It was Jija Bai. Shiva bowed to his mother. She blessed him saying, "Victory be yours ! " and solemnly charged his companions to keep him safe; they vowed obedience. Then they walked down to the foot of the fort and waited.

Meanwhile Afzal Khan had started from his camp at Par, with a strong escort of more than a thousand musketeers. Gopinath objected to it, saying that such a display of force would scare away Shiva from the interview, and that the Khan should, therefore, take with himself only two body-guards exactly as Shiva had done. So, he left his troops some distance behind and made his way up the hill-path in a palki accompanied by two soldiers and a famous swordsman named Sayyid Banda, as well as the two Brahman envoys, Gopinath and Krishnaji. Arrived in the tent, Afzal Khan angrily remarked on its princely furniture and decorations as far above the proper style of a jagirdars son. But Gopinath soothed him by saying that all these rich things would soon go to the Bijapur palace as the first fruits of Shiva's submission.