Later Mughals v2.c18.s8.8

v2.c18.s8.8

The Indian Musalman and Rajput soldiers were very inefficient in the use of fire-arms. The only musketeers of any value in the Mughal army in the 17th century were the Hindus of Buxar, the Bundelas, the Karnatakis (of whom there were many in the service of the Bijapur Sultans, but none under the Later Mughals), and a small class of hunters called Bahelias usually recruited in the Allahabad province. The immense majority of the Indian soldiers did not fight with muskets, nor did they, as a rule, carry into the field portable light artillery of the *jazair* class in large numbers. The Indian ordnances were heavy cumbrous and of a more antiquated type than those of Persia and Turkey, and therefore the fire delivered by them was usually slow and inaccurate enough to be neglected. The Indian soldiers were trained to stake everything on the shock charge of heavy cavalry and hand to hand grapple. They had little mobility. Not so the Qizilbashes in the Persian service. Like their fellow-Turanians in Trans-oxiana or in the armies of the Usmanli Sultans of Constantinople, they formed the best cavalry in Asia,—hardy and fast horsemen, mounted on the fleetest and strongest breed of horses, and trained to the saddle from their childhood, as became a nomad race. They were also capital archers, accustomed to shoot from the saddle and fight while fleeing. They had a decisive advantage over the Indians, as men fighting with missiles have over those who can employ side-arms only.