South India and her Muhammadan Invaders c12.16

c12.16

*His ambitious projects.*—Two magnificent projects, one against Khorassan and Persia, and the other against China had formed in his mind, which, as usual with him, he determined to carry out. He raised an army of three hundred and seventy thousand soldiers who, after waiting for a year, found their pay falling into arrears and became clamorous. They had to be disbanded and the project was abandoned for the time. But a year’s maintenance of such a vast army must none the less have exhausted the treasury. He then had recourse to the other expedient of issuing token coins. Instead of copying the Chinese practice of issuing paper notes he adopted copper tokens to pass as silver *tanka*. This naturally led to false coinage. All genuine coin passed out of circulation and the currency got completely discredited. Quite naturally this was the occasion for revolts and the more distant provinces began first.