Page:History of India Vol 5.djvu/45

WAES IN SINDAN 23 became salt, and lie sent out several marauding expe- ditions against them. Dissensions then arose between the Nizarians and Yamanians, and Amran joined with the latter. Omar ibn Abu-1-Aziz al-Habbari consequently went to him and killed him unawares. Mansur ibn Hatim related to me that Fazl ibn Mahan, formerly a slave of the sons of Sama, got into Sindan and subdued it. He then sent an elephant to the Caliph Mamun, wrote to him, and offered up prayers for him in the Jami* Masjid, which he built there. When he died, he was succeeded by Mohammad ibn Fazl ibn Mahan. He proceeded with sixty vessels against the Meds of Hind. He killed a great number of them, captured Kallari, and then returned toward Sindan. But his brother, named Mahan, had made him- self master of Sindan, and wrote to the Caliph Mu'tasim bi- Allah, and sent him as a present the largest and longest teak-tree that had ever been seen. But the Indians were under the control of his brother whom they liked, so they slew Mahan and crucified him. The Indians afterwards made themselves masters of Sindan, but they spared the mosque, and the Mohammedans used to meet in it on Fridays and pray for the caliph. Abu Bakr, who had been a slave of the Karizis, related to me that the country called al-Usaifan, lying between Kashmir and Multan and Kabul, was governed by a wise king. The people of this country worshipped an idol for which they had built a temple. The son of the king fell sick and the king desired the priests