Meanwhile Holkar saw his opportunity and struck his blow. Profiting by the absence of his rival, he for the first time since 1773, advanced on Hindustan; and summoning Ismail Beg like an evil spirit from his temporary obscurity, he hurled him upon the country round the capital, while he himself lost no time in forcing a rupture with Sindhia's civil deputy in Rajputana. In the northern part of the Rewari country is a place called Kanaund; about equidistant from Dehli and Hansi, to the south of both cities. Here Najaf Kuli Khan had breathed his last in a stronghold of earth faced with stone, on the borders of the great Bikanir desert, among sand-hills and low growths of tamarisk; and here his widow — a sister of the deceased Gholam Kadir — continued to reside. A call to surrender the fort to Sindhia's officers being refused by the high-spirited Pathan lady, gave Ismail Beg occasion to reappear upon the scene. He hastened to her aid, but found the place surrounded by a force under the command of M. Perron, a French officer whose name will often recur hereafter. The Beg, as usual, attacked furiously, and, as usual, was defeated. He took refuge in the fort which he contrived to enter, and the defence of which he conducted for some time. But the lady being killed by a shell, the garrison lost heart, and began to talk of throwing overboard the Moghul Jonah. The latter, obtaining from Perron a promise of his life being spared, and having that strong faith in the truth of his promise which is the real homage that Asiatics pay to Europeans, lost no time in coming into camp, and was sent into confinement at Agra, where he remained till his death a few years later. Francklin, writing about 1794, says that he had no chance of deliverance so long as Mahratta sway endured at Dehli; but that he might, otherwise, still live to play a conspicuous part. But I believe he died about four years later. His residence was in the quarters near the Dehli Gate of the Fort, popularly known as Dan Sah Jat's house, still standing.