A History of the Mahrattas v1.c14.13

v1.c14.13

About the middle of this year, a treaty was concluded at Agra betwixt Aurungzebe and Ali Adil Shah; the terms, on the part of the Beejapoor court, were negotiated by Shah Abdool Hoossein Kamana, who gave up, as the price of peace, the fort of Sholapoor and territory yielding 180,000 pagodas of annual revenue. No other particulars are ascertained; but in consequence, as is supposed, of this treaty, Sivajee, lest the Moghuls should interfere, had an interview with Jeswunt Sing and the prince, in order to purchase their connivance to his designs on Beejapoor and Golcondah.¹ He was about to levy his chouth and surdeshmookhee from the former, when Abdool Mohummud, the prime minister, purchased exemption, by agreeing to pay him an annual sum of three lacks of rupees.² This compact, like the others entered into with that minister by Sivajee, was kept secret at Beejapoor,³ where the Mahomedans had still pride enough to feel the degrading submission of paying tribute to Hindoos, although a factious nobility and a wasteful court deprived the minister of means to assert the dignity of the kingdom.