Page:History of India Vol 5.djvu/285

THE MAKCH TO SIALKOT 237 I judged it most advisable to form a junction with the detachment of my army that was in Lahore before I offered battle. I therefore sent messengers with in- structions to the amirs, and at the second march reached the banks of the river Chinab, where I encamped. On Friday, the fourteenth of Rabi'-al-awwal, we arrived at Sialkot. Every time that I entered Hin- dustan, the Jats and Gujars regularly poured down in prodigious numbers from their hills and wilds in order to carry off oxen and buffalos. These were the wretches that really inflicted the chief hardships and were guilty of the severest oppression in the country. These districts had been in a state of revolt in former times and had yielded very little revenue that could be collected. On the present occasion, when I had reduced the whole of the neighbouring districts to sub- jection, they began to repeat their practices. As my unfortunate people were on their way from Sialkot to the camp, hungry and naked, indigent and in distress, they were attacked along the road with loud shouts and plundered. I sought out the persons guilty of this outrage, discovered them, and ordered two or three of them to be cut in pieces. A merchant arrived at this same station, bringing the news of the defeat of Ala-ad-din Khan by Sultan Ibrahim. The particulars are as follows: Ala-ad-din Khan, after taking leave of me, had marched forward, despite the scorching heat of the weather, and had reached Lahore, having gone two days' journey every march without any consideration for those who accom-