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CHAPTER IV.
GURU GOVIND SINGH, FOUNDER OF THE KHALSA, THE SIKH COMMONWEALTH.
Young Govind, who became the tenth Guru on the death of his father, Tegh Bahadur, in 1675, being surrounded by enemies, retired to the Himalayas at the headwaters of the Jumna, and there lived for twenty years, devoting himself to study and the chase. At the age of thirty-five he issued from his retreat, having matured his plans for reforming the Sikhs and making them a separate people. The violent death of his father and the deep sense of the wrongs of his persecuted race resolved him to make them prominent as a nation. He summoned the dispersed Sikhs from all parts to join him: crowds
