he view which we at last obtained of the lovely Mohammedan city of
Bhopal. To the south and east ran a strip of country as barren and
heartacheish as if the very rocks and earth had turned Buddhist,
beyond which a range of low rounded hills, not unlike _topes_,
completed the ascetic suggestion. But, turning from this, we saw
Mohammedanism at its very loveliest. Minarets, domes, palaces,
gardens, the towers of the citadel, waters of lovely lakes, all
mingled themselves together in the voluptuous light of the low
sun: there was a sense of music, of things that sparkled, of pearly
lustres, of shimmering jewels, of softness, of delight, of luxury.
Bhopal looked over the ragged valley like a sultan from the window of
his zenana regarding afar off an unkempt hermit in his solitude. My
companion had arranged for permission to enter the town, and it was
not long ere we were installed in the house of a friend of Bhima
Gandharva's, whose guests we remained during our stay in Bhopal.

[Illustration: MUSSULMAN WOMAN OF BHOPAL.]

On a rock at the summit of a hill commanding this interesting city
stands the fort of Fatehgarh, built by a certain Afghan adventurer,
Dost Mohammed Khan, who, in a time when this part of India must have
been a perfect paradise for all the free lances of the East, was
so fortunate as to win the favor of Aurungzebe, and to receive as
evidence thereof a certain district in Malwa. The Afghan seems to
have lost no time in improving the foothold thus gained, and he thus
founded the modern district of Bhopal, which was formerly divided
between Malwa and Gondwana, one gate of the town standing in the
former and one in the latter country. Dost Mohammed Khan appears,
indeed, to have been not the only adventurer who bettered his fortunes
in Bhopal. It is a curious fact, and one well illustrating the
liberality which has characterized much of the more modern history of
the Bhopal government, that no long time ago it was administered by
a regency consisting of three persons--one a Hindu, one a Mohammedan,
and the other a Christian. This Christian is mentioned by Sir John
Malcolm as "Shahzed Musseah, or Belthazzar Bourbona" (by which Sir
John means _Shahzahad Messiah_--a native appellation signifying "the
Christian prince"--or _Balthazar of Bourbon_), and is described by
that officer, to whom he was well known, as a brave soldier and an
able man. He traced his lineage to a certain Frenchman calling himself
John of Bou