His approaching attendants found the nineteen year
old Emperor standing quietly by the side of the slaughtered beast
which he had struck to the ground with a single blow of his sword. To
how much bodily strength, intrepidity, cold-blooded courage and
sure-sightedness this blow of the sword testified which dared not come
the fraction of a second too late, may be judged by every one who has
any conception of the spring of a raging tigress anxious for the
welfare of her young. And we may easily surmise the thoughts which the
sight aroused in the minds of the Mohammedan nobles in Akbar's train.
At that moment many ambitious wishes and designs may have been carried
to their grave.[6]
[Footnote 6: Noer, I, 141.]
The Emperor soon summoned his hot-headed foster-brother Adham Chan to
court in order to keep him well in sight for he had counted often
enough on Akbar's affection for his mother Mahum Anaga to save him
from the consequences of his sins. Now Mahum Anaga, her son and her
adherents, hated the grand vizier with a deadly hatred because they
perceived that they were being deprived of their former influence in
matters of state. This hatred finally impelled Adham Chan to a
senseless undertaking. The embittered man hatched up a conspiracy
against the grand vizier and when one night in the year 1562 the
latter was attending a meeting of political dignitaries on affairs of
state in the audience hall of the Imperial palace, Adham Chan with his
conspirators suddenly broke in and stabbed the grand vizier in the
breast, whereupon his companions slew the wounded man with their
swords.
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