142 AUEANGZIB THE PUKITAN EMPEROR

unchecked. The peasantry and working classes, and even the better sort of merchants, used every precau- tion to hide such small prosperity as they might enjoy; they dressed and lived meanly, and suppressed all incli- nations towards social ambitions. Whether we look at the military or the civil side of the system, the Moghul domination in India was even more like an army of occupation than the " camp ' to which the Ottoman Empire has been compared. As Bernier says, " The Great Moghul is a foreigner in Hindustan: he finds himself in a hostile country, or nearly so; a country containing hundreds of Gentiles to one Moghul, or even to one Mohammedan." Hence his large armies and his network of governors and land- holders dependent upon him alone for dignity and sup- port; hence, too, a policy which sacrificed the welfare of the people to the supremacy of an armed minority. Yet it preserved internal peace and secured the author- ity of the throne, and we read of few disturbances or insurrections in all the half-century of Aurangzib's reign. Such wars as were waged were either unim- portant campaigns of aggression outside the normal limits of the empire, or were deliberately provoked by the emperor's tolerance. Mir Jumla's disastrous expedition against Assam was like many other attempts to subdue the northeast frontiers of India. The rains and the guerrilla tactics of the enemy drove the Mo- ghul army to despair, and its gallant leader died on his return in the spring of 1663. The war in Arakan had more lasting effects. This kingdom had long been