122 AURANGZIB THE PURITAN EMPEROR

of his great empire, as to bring the lands of the heretical shi* a within the dominion of orthodox Islam. Religion induced Aurangzib to abjure the pleasures of the senses as completely as if he had indeed become the fakir he had once desired to be. No animal food passed his lips, and his drink was water; so that, as Ta vernier says, he became " thin and meagre, to which the great fasts which he keeps have contributed. During the whole of the duration of the comet [four weeks, in 1665], which appeared very large in India, where I then was, Au- rangzib drank only a little water and ate a small quan- tity of millet bread; this so much affected his health that he nearly died, for besides this he slept on the ground, with only a tiger-skin over him; and since that time he has never had perfect health." Following the Prophet's precept that every Moslem should prac- tise a trade, he devoted his leisure to making skull- caps, which were doubtless bought up by the courtiers of Delhi with the same enthusiasm as was shown by the ladies of Moscow for Count Tolstoi's boots. He not only knew the Koran by heart, but copied it twice over in his fine calligraphy, and sent the manuscripts, richly adorned, as gifts to Mekka and Medina. Ex- cept the pilgrimage, which he dared not risk lest he should come back to find an occupied throne, he left nothing undone of the whole duty of the Moslem. Aurangzib, it must be remembered, might have cast the precepts of Mohammed to the winds and still kept -nay, strengthened his hold of the sceptre of Hin- dustan. After the general slaughter of his rivals, his