Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c15.s9.3

v1.c15.s9.3

Safdar Jang had issued from Delhi on 26th March, but was in no haste to go to his own province. He lingered in the environs, pleading lack of transport, but really in the expectation that the Emperor would come down on his knees, as he had done so often before, and recall him to the Court armed with supreme authority. He could not at first imagine,—and hardly anybody else imagined—that armed opposition to him was possible. So, from his camp in the suburbs he held daily parleys with the Emperor and sent challenges to his rivals who lay safely sheltered within the walls of the capital. Safdar Jang was unwilling to raise his hand against his royal master; the fate of the Sayyid brothers was before him. [Bayān, 277; TAh. 50b-51a; Ch. Gul. 408b; Muz. 69; Siyar, iii. 46.]