[ 156 ] 



Hindoo records in Ferishta positively assert the continuance of that 

 dependance,in the following passage : Speaking of the last sovereign 

 of the race of Barage, (he means BAL RAJAH ; for, the descendants 

 of Bali Rama still reigned on the throne of Oude, in Bahar, where, 

 in fact, this history places the capital of Barage,) Ferishta tells us 

 that " Keidar, a Brahmin, from the mountains of Sewalic, having 

 collected a great army, invaded him, and having in the end entirely 

 defeated the king, wielded the sceptre of government with his own 

 hands. When Keidar, the Brahmin, had claspt the bride of royalty 

 in his arms, being a man of learning and genius, he became a great 

 king ; but, carrying the trappings ofCai-Caus and Cm-Khosru on his 

 shoulders, he was constrained, by way of tribute, to send them annual 

 gifts. In the latter end of his reign, one Shinkol, a native of Kin- 

 noge, (the Shangal alluded to before,) having strengthened himself, 

 took possession of Bengal and Bahar, where he had been governor ; 

 and, leading a great army against Keidar, after many battles had 

 been fought with various success, the fortune of Shinkol at length 

 prevailed*." 



It is not my intention to enter in this place into any more length- 

 ened detail than has been given, in the preceding chapter, concern- 

 ing the warlike acts of the mighty Khosru and his general Rostam ; 

 I mean only to shew that India, during the extended period of their 

 glory in Asia, was not, as the Greek accounts insinuate, by making 

 Hystaspes the first explorer of the Indus and the adjoining districts, 

 wholly independent of the Persian empire. The fact is, that Rostam, 

 by holding the large principalities of Sigestan and Zablestan, the 

 ancient Drangiana and Arachosia, closely confining on the Western 

 India, as fiefs, from the kings of Persia, possessed the key that 

 opened an immediate passage into the heart of India ; for, it has 



* Ferishta, vol. i. p. 18, idem edit. 



