The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1885-08-28
TAM RlANE.
A Conspicuous Figure In Indian History
From the Tenth to the Fourteenth Centu-

A Conspicuous Figure In Indian History
From the Tenth to the Fourteenth Centu-
ries.
There is no chapter Of the worlds his
tory 50 crammed with fighting as that
which chronicles the doings in India
from the tenth century to the fourteenth,
and to endeavor to condense any ac-
count of the numerous sieges suffered
by Delhi and by many another city of
northern India during that period would
be to produce picture of unccasing
bloodshed and of wearisome sameness.
The character of Timur Beg, or Tanner
lane. however, is so extraordinary as to
merit description. From him dates the
famous Moghul Empire, finally ex-
tingushed in the present century by alb
sorption into the East India Company.
..His successors" says Gibbon, sex
tended their sway from the mountains
of Kashmir to Cape Comorin. and from
Kandahar to the Gulf of Bengal. Since
the reign of Aurungzebe their empire
has been dissolved, their treasures of
Delhi have been rifled by Persian
robber (Nadir Shah). and the richest of
their kingdoms is now possessed by a
company OF Christian merchants Of a
remote island in the Northern Ocean,"
1t is said that Timur Beg was grave
man of quiet manners, halt of one hand
and one foot. and delighting in the
game of chess. which he greatly COM
plicated by doubling the number of
| pieces from thirty-twO to sixty -four.
He is described as ruling his household
with calm equity, by no means sparing
his sons from the observance Of the law:
temperate and regular in his life, and
aiming ever ut the Establishment of an
ideal kingdom where child might
carry purse of gold in safety from
east to west of the Asian continent.
How man of such character could Mt
the same time be SO emphatically the
arch destroyer If mankind Is not clear.
AS for the authority he exercised over
his children, it is ut least certain that
when he invaded India. his grandson
Pr MOhammad had made little war
for himself at Multan. and would have
persisted miserably had his grandfather
not come to his rescue. How young
Pr went out to conquer India on his
own account is not told, but it is GER
tain that Timur was not provoked to
any act of sharp justice. Thurs sons
seemed to have only waited for his
their leisure.
Timur. the wild chess-player. signal
lied his success in India by Il series Of
barbarous massacres. At one time
on one day alone he murdered one
hundred thousand prisoners in cold
blood, lest they should turn against him.
Having conquered the weak Mahmoud
! Ill. before Delhi. he entered the city,
and had himself proclaimed emperor
in all the mosques on Friday (the Mus
lin Sunday, and Immediately left the
city to the mercy of his MOghul sol
diers. who burned, plundered. and slew
till they were weary. He afterwards
returned, and gave evidence of his
taste for the beautiful by ordering the
famous mosque of FerOse, which had
escaped the flames. to be copied in Sa-
markand.
These doings of Timur appear the
more barbarOus when we remember
that he was himself mussulman sack
ing mussulman kings city and
staying by the hundred thousand
his mussulman subjects. He had
not the excuse which he subsequently
aliedsed in support of his cxpedi-
ton against China, that he was
carrying the faith of the Prophet
into heather country. The kingdom
founded by Mohammad of Ghor was
essentially Muslin. and its invasion by
Tamerlin was rs purely arbitrary an
act of plumber as was the conquest OF
his own successors by Nadir Shah, the
Persian freebooter of the eighteenth
I century.
Timur died of drinking too much iced
water on the march to China in nos.
As was to be expected, his kingdom, OF
empire. fell TO pieces. and for 4 hum
dred and twenty years series of par
venu empcrors of all sorts reigned AT
Delhi. besieging it. taking it. and hold
ing it as they were able.-F. Maiion
Crawford in Harpers Magazine.