AKBER THE GREAT, AN HISTORICAL SKETCH.* 
By THE Hon. PERCY WYNDHAM, M.P. 
(Presidential Address at the Workington Annual Meeting. ) 
AKBER THE GREAT stands in the front rank of those who have 
been wise and beneficent rulers of mankind, if, indeed, he does 
not occupy a position by himself in advance of all his compeers. 
The searching light of modern criticism, which has dethroned so 
many idols, and on the other hand has called upon us to regard 
with honour and gratitude the memory of men heretofore classed 
with the worst, has never been thrown upon the person and history 
of Akber. 
If subjected to such criticism, the probabilities are, however, 
that he would come out unscathed by the ordeal. In the con- 
temporary records, his character comes out with greater clearness 
and grandeur in the accounts of hostile writers, than in the fulsome 
pages of his flatterers. The life and character of Akber are so 
remarkable, and his reign so illustrious, that he became the subject 
of complete biographies and histories, by native authors of high 
reputation ; while the records of the English Embassies, and the 
residence at Agra of Europeans of different nations, in considerable 
numbers, give undoubted confirmation on many points, which are 
entirely wanting in regard to many former monarchs of India. 
He was one of those Emperors of India, known to our fathers 
as the Great Mogul, whose latest descendant, then a monarch only 
* The books largely quoted in this sketch are Elphinstone’s History of 
India. London: John Murray, 1874.—A Student’s Manual of the History of 
India, by MEADOowsS TayLor. London: Longmans, 1870,—Ayeen Akbery. 
3 vols. Calcutta, 1783. 
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