Storia do Mogor 98.4

98.4

I tendered my excuses, and said in addition that I was most desirous to see different parts of the world ; there was also the aversion [54] I had to Aurangzeb ; and equally the face of I'tibar Khan displeased me — in fact, to speak properly, he looked like a baboon. To me it seemed that from one with a face like that no good deed could proceed. Nevertheless, I did not fail to go several times to court, as requested by I'tibar Khan, he imagining in this way to overcome little by little my resolve and bring me to take employment. But each time I went to the audience served only to renew my determination not to stay in Agrah. Going thus several times into the fort, I noted that the imprisonment of Shahjahan was closer than can be expressed. There passed not a day, while I and others were in conversation with the governor, that there did not come under-eunuchs to whisper into his ear an account of all the acts and words of Shahjahan, and even what passed among the wives, ladies, and slave-girls. Sometimes, smiling at what the eunuchs told him, he would make the company sharers in what was going on inside, adding some foul expressions in disparagement of Shahjahan. Not content with this even, he sometimes allowed it to be seen that he treated him as a miserable slave. Once an under-eunuch came to tell him that Shahjahan was in want of ' papuz ' (pāposh), which are slippers without heels, such as Mahomedans wear.