Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c6.s2.16

v1.c6.s2.16

And yet the condition of the empire, even before Nādir Shāh gave it the death stab, was such that only a wise, strong and active wazir, exercising dictatorial power, could have saved it. On the contrary, king and minister alike were now more dead than alive. As the historian Wārid, whose youth had been nurtured in the dignified and strenuous reign of Aurangzib, wrote in the bitterness of his heart about the times of Muhammad Shāh, "For some years past it has been the practice of the imperial Court that whenever the officers of the Deccan or Gujrāt and Mālwa reported any Marāthā incursion to the Emperor, His Majesty, in order to soothe his heart afflicted by such sad news, either visited the gardens—to look at the newly planted and leafless trees,—or rode out to hunt in the plains, while the grand wazir Itimād-ud-daulah Qamr-ud-din Khān went to assuage his feelings by gazing at the lotuses in some pools situated four leagues from Delhi, where he would spend a month or more in tents, enjoying pleasure or hunting fish in the rivers and deer in the plains. At such times Emperor and wazir alike lived in total forgetfulness of the business of the administration, the collection of the revenue, and the needs of the army. No chief, no man, thinks of guarding the realm and protecting the people, while these disturbances daily grow greater." [Mirāt-i-Wāridāt, 117-118.]