Shahbaz Khan first tried to
corrupt the
commandant of the fort, Syed Tayyib, through
his friend Mirza Kamran, by saying that the
astrologers had predicted the throne for Murad,
and therefore to resist him was two court one'sSurat fort besieged.
own ruin. The honest qiladar held firmly to his
duty, and when Shahbaz advanced with his force
to attempt an assault, he drove
him back by a smart discharge
of artillery. So Shahbaz had to
encamp at a safe distance and begin the slow
and tedious work of cannonading. But his guns
being light pieces, no harm was done to the fort
walls, and the siege[1] dragged on for weeks.
Four or five big guns sent from Junagarh were
too long in arriving. Success could be secured
only by other means. Under the guidance of
some Dutch artificers, he ran mines. The
- ↑ For the siege of Surat Fort, Isardas, 11a and b; Tavernier, i. 328-329; Faiyaz-ul-qawanin, 421, 422 (mine fired on 20 Dec.), 423, 459, 461, 462; Khafi Khan, ii. 7; Alamgirnamah, 134 (meagre). In a letter to Shaista Khan, Murad pretends that he had merely sent his men (—six thousand troopers with guns!)—to draw his salary assigned on the Surat treasury as usual, when the qiladar, acting in Dara's interest, shut the fort gate in their face and opened fire on them; and that at the same time a letter from the qiladar's son at Court was intercepted reporting the death of Shah Jahan. Murad claims to have acted merely in self-defence. (Faiyas, 454).
vast size. In front of the castle is the maidan [or esplanade]."