DELHI. 
51 
own strength and valour, that he would not suffer 
any alteration in the usual habits of his household. 
He would not permit his followers to remain in his 
house during the night, because he knew it to be 
their custom to depart each man to his own house 
after he had retired to rest. An aged porter was 
the only domestic who remained under his roof ; 
and of this circumstance, which indeed is common 
throughout India, the assassins were not ignorant. 
They made a careful examination of the premises, 
and found that on the right-hand side, immediately 
within the entrance, there was a room, used by the 
chief as a writing-chamber, communicating with his 
sleeping apartment by a narrow passage. This they 
determined to make their rendezvous, and accord- 
ingly, after dark, they took advantage of the tempo- 
rary absence of the old porter, and conveyed them- 
selves without discovery into the house. 
At night, the principal entrance having been closed 
according to custom, Shere Afghan and his family 
retired to rest at the usual hour. Some of the 
assassins, when they thought it probable that he had 
fallen asleep, stole noiselessly into his apartment, 
and prepared to plunge their daggers into his body. 
But one of them, who was an old man, being touched 
with remorse, cried out with a loud voice, “ Hold ! 
hold ! my brethren ; have we not the Suba’s 
orders for what we do ? Let us then behave like 
men, and do our duty with humanity, though firmly. 
