CuAP. v.] DEATH OF IIOOMAYOON. 119
In the meantime circumstances in India had become favom-able, and Hooma- ad. issc.
yoon, setting out from Cabool in January, 1555, at the head of 15,000 liorse, invaded the Punjab and took Lahore. After some delay he continued his march, noomayoon
agfiiii iiins-
obliged Sikundur Shah to take refuge among the lower ranges of the Himalaya, ter..f ueiiu and made liimself master of Delhi and Agi*a. He had thus regained possession "" '^^'^ of his capital and a portion of his original ten-itories, but was not destined long to enjoy them His life had been the sport of fortune — his death was to resemble it. He had only been six months in Delhi, and was one day, after a walk on the terrace of his library, descending by the stair, which wjis placed on the outside, and consisted of narrow steps, guarded only by a parapet about a foot high. Hearing the call to prayer from the minaret, he stopped, as is usual, repeated his creed, and sat down to wait till the muezzin had made his round. In rising, his staff by which he was supporting himself slipped, and he fell headlong over the parapet. He was taken up insensible, and died four days after, Hia dentil. on the 25th of January, 1556, at the age of fifty-one. He had commenced his reign twenty -five years before, but sixteen of these had been spent in exile from his capital.
As Hoomayoon's reign reached to the middle of the sixteenth century, it may be considered as forming the link between medieval and modern India. It will be proper, therefore, before continuing the narrative, to take a survey of the political condition of India at this period.
In the reign of Mahomed Toghlak, which commenced in 1 325, almost the Political whole of India proper — understanding by that name both Hindoostan and the india. Deccan — was subject to Mahometan sway. The chief territories not thus subject were a long narrow tract in the south-west of the ]ieninsula, the kingdom of Orissa, consisting of an unexplored and densely wooded region, stretching for about 500 miles along the coast from the Ganges to the Godavery, with a medium width of about 350 miles ; and Rajpootana in the north-west, consisting of a number of independent chieftainships, of which the lunits cannot easily be assigned, as they were constantly changing in their dimensions, according as the Mahometan invaders or the native chiefs gained the ascendency. Before the termination of Mahomed Toghlaks reign, in 1351, the extent of his dominions had shrunk exceedingly, in consequence of his inisgovernment. In 1 3 10 Bengal tlirew off its yoke, and became an independent kingdom; in 1344, the example was imitated by the Rajahs of Telingana and Carnata, the former recovering liis capital of Wurungole, and the latter establishing a new ca])ital at Eijanagm*, (»n the Toombudi-a ; while the Mahometans were obliged to rest satisfied with a frontier which extended no farther south than the banks of the Krishna, and no farther east than the meridian of Hyderabad. In 1347, a Hindoo movement on a still more extended scale took place, and the ^lahometans were driven across the Nerbudda. Hassan Gangii, the head of this last movement, founded in the Deccan the extensive kingdom of Bahmani, which continued to subsist
