Siyar al-mutaʾakhkhirin 10.2.10

10.2.10

and he was convinced at the same time, how exceedingly improper it would be in a person of his high station to defer the punition of a headstrong man, whose punition ought to be held up in terrorem to others. The day then being fixed for that execution, Aaly-verdy-qhan ordered a number of his trustiest men to keep themselves in the Hall of Audience, and to fall upon him with their sabres as soon as that Afghan should enter, and presume to answer to a reprimand which he intended to give him. Effectively the next day the man, as usual, presented himself with ten of his followers, armed; but as he had always at the gate a couple of hundred of his men ready to support him, and he was himself a man of great personal strength and prowess, it was not an easy matter to come at him, or to find people that could match the man. Three such men having been pitched upon at last, were ordered to attend and to dispatch him. The next morning the execution took place; so that the smoke that used to arise from the heads of the refractory, was at once dissipated. The soldiery began to tremble, and many of the Zemindars, who had hitherto proved refractory, and had acted with all the freedom and insolence to which the weakness of the former administration had accustomed them, were set upon one after another, and severely chastised.