Fall of the Mughal Empire v3.c36.s8.33

v3.c36.s8.33

Even then the imperial regent might have achieved a creditable degree of success and secured no inconsiderable payment of money, if he had possessed the practical wisdom to strike a bargain promptly and prefer a realisable moderate tribute to impossibly high demands. The royal minion who had spent all his life at Court and whose sole weapon was his smooth deceitful tongue, found himself utterly at sea amidst the conflicting interests and tangled politics of the Sarhind province. And he made the situation worse confounded by mingling his private passions with his public duties and daily shifting his ground, instead of firmly following one clear-cut policy, as Najaf Khan used to do.