his sanctity, his caste? There was fear in the high quarters of Bráhmanism, and Bráhmans were a ruling power in the Sepoy army.
The Musalmán had a personal grievance. He was feeling the dull pain of humiliated authority and tarnished prestige. In the days of the great Mughal Emperors the Muhammadan rule had stretched far and wide. Eastward and southward — across the rich delta of Bengal, the rice fields of Dacca, the fat homesteads of Arcot, Muhammadan rulers had exercised sway, and Muhammadan soldiers and officials had enjoyed the pleasant privileges of victorious rule. Those halcyon days had passed. The Muhammadan had now to compete on equal terms with the race which he had conquered and despised.
His temperament, his creed, his education, disabled him from contending successfully with the subtle and quick-witted Hindu. The present was distressful. He brooded gloomily over the past. His lawful Sovereign sat with his sham Court at Delhi, more prisoner than prince — a pale shade of his former greatness. He was humbled. His conquerors were now devising fresh humiliations for his son. Haidarábád and Lucknow alone remained of the mighty kingdoms which derived their sovereignty from Delhi; and now the suppression of the Lucknow Court once again sounded in the Musalmán's ears the knell of departing glory. In his dreams of the future, the fall of the British rule presented itself to the eye of faith as opening a possibility of restoration. The Musalmán's
