THE SHAH DETERMINES TO ATTACK HERAT. 293 for undertaking a war against the Prince of Herat, besides those founded upon the conquests of a bygone dynasty. Of the three engagements which Prince Kaniran had contracted during the last years of the lifetime of Fetteh Ali Shah, he had fulfilled not one. He had not razed the fort of Ghorian, neither had he despatched to their homes certain Persian families who were to be released from captivity ; nor had he paid to the king of Persia the sum stipulated for as the amount of tribute. The Shah was therefore fully justified in determining to compel him by force of arms to fulfil his engagements. There was also another reason for the advance of the King of Persia upon Herat. On the borders of Aff- ghanistan, and lying between that country and Persia, extends the province of Seistan. Seistan had been added to the Affghan kingdom by Ahmed Shah, the founder of the Sedozye dynasty. During the lifetime of that monarch it continued to appertain to Cabul, but in the troubled times which followed his death, when his successors had difficulty in consolidating their power, the chiefs of Seistan succeeded in establishing the indepen- dence of their province. The Persian government during the reign of the first Kajar Shah, and the early years of his successor, had enough to occupy its attention without going into the question of its right to dominion over Seistan. But as the dynasty became established, its ambition gradually became enlarged, and by the time of the accession of Mahomed Meerza to the throne, Seistan had come to be considered at Tehran as an integral por- tion of the dominions of the Shah ; although up to that time, the Persian monarch could boast no more immediate control over the Seistanis than was implied by a rival
