struck with horror and
amazement at this action, by virtue of his exorcisms and sorceries, he
caused her head to fix on again, and no sign remained of any wound.

The same prince, who was very fortunate during his reign, shewed the
utmost attention and respect to his mother, of which he one day gave the
following striking instance:--Being on a journey between Lahore and
Agra, on which occasion his mother accompanied him, being carried in a
palanquin, and having to pass a river, he took one of the poles of the
palanquin on his own shoulder, commanding his greatest nobles to do the
same, and in this manner carried her across the river. He never denied
her any request that ever she made, except one, and this was, that our
Bible might be hung about the neck of an ass, and so beaten about the
town of Agra. The reason of this strange request was, that the
Portuguese had taken a ship of theirs, in which they found a copy of the
_Koran_, or bible of the Mahometans, which they tied about the neck of a
dog, and beat the dog about the streets of Ormus. But he denied her this
request, saying, That if it were evil in the Portuguese to have so done
with the Koran, it did not become a king to requite evil with evil, as
the contempt of any religion was contempt of God, and he would not be
revenged upon an innocent book. The moral of this is, that God would not
permit the sacred book of his law and truth to be contemned among the
infidels.

One day in every year, for the amusement of the king's women, all the
tradesmen's wives are admitted into the _Mahal_, having each somewhat to
sell, after the manner of a fair, and at which the king acts as broker
for his wives, no other man being present, and by means of his gains on
this occasion, provides his own supper. By this means he attains to a
sight of all the pretty women of the city; and at a fair of this kind he
got his beloved _Noor Mahal_.

After _Shaof Freed_ had won the battle of Lahore by a stratagem, all the
captains of the rebel army, to the number of two thousand, who had been
taken by the king, were hung up upon flesh-hooks, or set upon stakes,
forming an avenue for the king's entrance into Lahore. On this occasion,
his son _Curseroo_, [Cusero] who had been made prisoner, rode beside
him, bare-footed, on an elephant, and the king asked him how he liked
that spectacle? To this the prince answered, That he was sorry to see so
much cruelty and injustice in his father, in thus ex