Heg. 1034 (1625).--Shah Jehan was pardoned by the Emperor. Candahar, a fortified town of Afghanistan, was taken by the Persians under the command of Shah Abbas their King, who appeared before it in person. The Usbeck Tartars invaded the province of Ghizni, but after an obstinate resistance of nine months were driven out of the empire. Heg. 1035 (1626).--Mohabet was accused of treason, and summoned before the Emperor. He obeyed, was grossly insulted, surprised Jehangire in his tent, made him prisoner, and carried him off to his own camp. The Vizier attempted a rescue, but was defeated with great slaughter. Mohabet resigned his power, was obliged to fly, and declared himself in favour of Shah Jehan. Heg. 1036 (1627).--Jehangire died. Dawir Buxsh, grandson of the late Emperor, was raised to the throne, deposed, and murdered. Shah Jehan arrived at Agra, and was proclaimed Emperor. Heg. 1037 (1628).--Shah Jehan ascended the throne of the Moguls. The Light of the World CHAPTER I. The morning dawned upon two travellers in the midst of a blighted wilderness. As the sun threw its level rays over the horizon, they flooded a plain where no boundary could be traced but the sky, and from which the dominion of vegetation was almost wholly withdrawn; there being nothing to relieve the dull, uniform sterility of the scene but occasionally the trunks of a few stunted trees, which appeared to stand there only as so many legible records of the utter barrenness of the spot. These sad wayfarers rose from beneath the scanty shades of one of those skeletons of the wilderness to pursue a journey with a deplorable prospect before them. They were far advanced upon a wide inhospitable desert, where no welcome serai was to be seen, and where the passenger was seldom met. The refreshing well was nowhere found in these dreary and unfruitful solitudes.