Page:History of India Vol 3.djvu/127

THE EEIGN OF FIROZ SHAH 97 ment, but the exception was unfortunate; for super- stitious folk saw in the black storm that darkened the world on the day of the holy man's death under the elephant's foot, and in the famine that ensued, omens of the fall of the crown. The invincible clemency and humility of the Sultan were incomprehensible and exasperating to his follow- ers. His was no ideal of kingship for an Eastern world. They resented his simplicity of life and even his familiar evenings with the old friends of his former obscurity. They did not appreciate his love of wit and learning. What they wanted was a fighting king, inexorable in his judgments and unsurpassable in his pomp. Sedi- tion grew apace, and the Sultan's nephew, Ala-ad-din, who had married his uncle's daughter, put himself at the head of the malcontents. After a course of dissim- ulation it was easy to deceive the kind-hearted unsus- pecting old man the nephew drew the Sultan unarmed and unguarded into a trap (1296), and as Firoz was stooping and actually fondling the traitor, Ala-ad-din gave the signal, and one of the basest murders in his- tory was accomplished. The aged king was slashed, thrown down, and beheaded, and his white hairs cast at the feet of the nephew he had trusted. " Although Ala-ad-din," writes Barani in just hor- ror, " reigned successfully for some years, and all things prospered to his wish, and though he had wives and children, family and adherents, wealth and grandeur, still he did not escape retribution for the blood of his patron. He shed more innocent blood than ever Pha-