ul
expedients for the prosperity of the country, but especially by the
concession of perfect liberty of faith and worship and by the
benevolent interest with which he regarded the religious practices of
the Hindus. A people in whom religion is the ruling motive of life,
after enduring all the dreadful sufferings of previous centuries for
its religion's sake, must have been brought to a state; of boundless
reverence by Akbar's attitude. And since the Hindus were accustomed to
look upon the great heroes and benefactors of humanity as incarnations
of deity we shall not be surprised to read from an author of that
time[17] that every morning before sunrise great numbers of Hindus
crowded together in front of the palace to await the appearance of
Akbar and to prostrate themselves as soon as he was seen at a window,
at the same time singing religious hymns. This fanatical enthusiasm of
the Hindus for his person Akbar knew how to retain not only by actual
benefits but also by small, well calculated devices.

[Footnote 17: Badaoni in Noer, II, 320.]

It is a familiar fact that the Hindus considered the Ganges to be a
holy river and that cows were sacred animals. Accordingly we can
easily understand Akbar's purpose when we learn that at every meal he
drank regularly of water from the Ganges (carefully filtered and
purified to be sure) calling it "the water of immortality,"[18] and
that later he forbade the slaughtering of cattle and eating their
flesh.[19] But Akbar did not go so far in his connivance with the
Hindus that he considered all their customs good or took them under
his protection. For instance he forbade child marriages among the
Hindus, that is to say the marriage of boys under sixteen and of girls
under fourteen years, and he permitted the remarriage of widows. The
barbaric customs of Brahmanism were repugnant to his very soul. He
therefore most strictly forbade the slaughtering of animals for
purposes of sacrifice, the use of ordeals for the execution of
justice, and the burning of widows against their will, which indeed
was not established according to Brahman law but was constantly
practiced according to traditional custom.[20] To be sure neither
Akbar nor his successor Jehangir were permanently successful in their
efforts to put an end to the burning of widows. Not until the year
1829 was the horrible custom practically done away with through the
efforts of the English.

[Footnote 18: Noer, II, 317, 318.