bath festival before the great temple of Mahabaleshwar on Shivaratri day (5th February.) He next marched to Ankola (nine miles northwards) with 4,000 infantry, sending all his fleet back, with the exception of twelve frigates, which he detained for transporting his army over the rivers on his way back to North Konkan. On the 22nd he came to Karwar. The English factors, having got early news of his coming from the spies they had sent out, put all the Company's ready money and portable goods on board a small hundred-ton ship belonging to the Imam of Maskat, then lying in the river, its captain Emanuel Donnavado promising to defend it as long as he lived or his vessel kept floating. The factors themselves took refuge in the ship. Sher Khan,* [1]a son of the late Khan-i-Khanan Ikhlas Khan and a subordinate of Bahlol Khan, arrived in the town that very night, without knowing anything about Shivaji's approach. With the help of his escort of 500 men he quickly fortified himself as well as he could to protect the goods he had brought down, and sent a messenger to Shiva in the night, warning him not to enter the town as he would resist him to the utmost. Sher Khan was famous throughout the country for his valour and ruling capacity, and his chief, Bahlol Khan, was "one of the potentest men in the kingdom of Bijapur." Shivaji, therefore,
- ↑ * The cause of his coming to Karwar was to charter a ship of Rustam-i-Zaman's to convey Bahlol Khan's mother to Mecca.
