Chand Beeby, the Dowager-queen of Ally Adil Shah, assumes charge of the government — she procures the minister to be seized and put to death, and raises another officer to his sta­tion, who, apprehensive of the Dowager's conduct, causes her to be seized, and confined in Satara. — The minister is ex­pelled by the people, and the Dowager is released. — Dissen­sions at the court. — The kings of Ahmudnuggur and Golconda unite to attack Beejapoor — they besiege it, but are compelled to withdraw. — Dilawur Khan protector. — Chand Beeby re­tires to Ahmudnuggur. — Civil war in Ahmudnuggur. — War between Ahmudnuggur and Beejapoor. — The protector Di-lawur Khan is compelled to fly from the capital. — The young King assumes charge of his government. — War against the Hindoos of the Carnatic and Mysore. — The Prince Ismael aspires to the throne, and suffers death. — War with Ahmud-nuggur. — The King of Ahmudnuggur is killed in battle.

IBRAHIM ADIL SHAH, upon his accession to the throne, being only in his ninth year, the manage­ment of public affairs devolved on Kamil Khan Deccany, and to the dowager Chand Beeby, the late king's widow, was intrusted the care of the young king's education. Every day, excepting on Wednesdays and Fridays, Ibrahim was seated on his throne in the hall of audience, when the current business was transacted in his presence. For some time Kamil Khan behaved with due mo­deration in his high office; but at length, intoxi­cated with power, he became guilty of some disrespect towards Chand Beeby, who turned her thoughts to effect his destruction. She therefore secretly sent a message to Hajy Kishwur Khan, an officer of high rank, observing, that as the Regent was unfit for his office, she wished to remove him, and to bestow it upon himself. Hajy Kishwur Khan, allured by these hopes of ad­vancement, formed a plot, with several chiefs, to seize Kamil Khan; and one evening, while he was holding a durbar in the green palace, Kish-wur Khan suddenly entered the citadel with four hundred armed men, shut the gates, confined the commanding officer of the garrison, and proceeded to secure the Regent. Kamil Khan, alarmed, attempted to fly towards the haram, in hopes of finding protection with Chand Beeby, when he was informed, by some of the eunuchs well disposed towards him, that the plot was formed by her. Confounded at this intelligence, he ran out of the palace, and, as his only chance of escape, flung himself over the wall of the citadel into the ditch, then full of water. He swam over, and passed undiscovered to the Imam gate of the city. This was, however, shut; but by the help of his turban, sash, and other cloths tied together, and fixed to one of the battlements of the city-wall, he de­scended, and hastened to his own house at no great distance, where he prepared for flight with his friends. Hajy Kishwur Khan, not finding his in­tended victim, supposed he was in the fort, and was employed near an hour in searching all the build­ings and places of concealment; after which he despatched a force to seek him without. Kamil Khan, having provided himself with as many jewels and as much money as time would allow, fled with seven or eight attendants towards Ahmudnuggur; but he had not gone above four miles before he was overtaken, and seized by the people of Kish-wur Khan, who cut off his head, and carried it to their patron; but they appropriated all the jewels and treasure found on his person to their own use.

Hajy Kishwur Khan, following the example of Kamil Khan, and supported by the patronage of Chand Beeby, grasped at the whole authority of the state, and ruled with uncontrolled sway. At this period, Behzad-ool-Moolk Toork, Meer No­but to Moortuza Nizam Shah, advanced from Ahmudnuggur, with fifteen thousand horse, to re­duce some districts belonging to Beejapoor; upon which the Regent detached Ein-ool-Moolk Geelany with an army to repel the enemy on the frontiers. Behzad-ool-Moolk suffered a total defeat near Shahdoorg, when all his tents, baggage, elephants, and artillery, fell into the hands of the victors, who returned in triumph to Beejapoor. The minister, by the advice of Chand Beeby, ordered rejoicing for three days, and conferred rich gifts and honor­ary distinctions on all the officers who had sig­nalised themselves in this expedition; but some time after, he thought proper to issue an order requiring the elephants taken on the occasion to be given up to the King. This act gave much offence to many of the nobles, who not only refused to comply, but secretly combined to remove him from the regency. Some advised that they should address Chand Beeby, and recommend her to send for Moostufa Khan from Bunkapoor, to take upon himself the administration of affairs; while others were for deferring any measure for the present, conceiving that as Syud Moortuza, governor of Berar, was on his march from Ahmudnuggur to revenge the defeat of Behzad-ool-Moolk, it would be inexpedient to attempt a change in the ministry till the enemy was driven away from the frontiers; but that object being once effected, they proposed retiring, as if in disgust, to Beejanuggur, and there taking measures, in concert with Chand Beeby, for accomplishing their ends.

Kishwur Khan, informed of these designs, took steps to prevent them. He sent an order under the royal seal to Meer Noor-ood-Deen, a ja-geerdar near Bunkapoor, to assassinate Moostufa Khan, promising to reward him for the deed with the estates and honours of that nobleman. Noor-ood-Deen, though he had been patronised by Moostufa Khan, and was indebted to him for his present office, undertook to perform this base action. He sent the bearer of the royal order into the fort, and at the same time private instructions by one Mahomed Ameen, addressed to the principal officers of the garrison, informing them, that Moostufa Khan meditated to put them to death, and to deliver up the fort to the Raja of the Car-natic, with whom he had entered into a design to subvert the royal authority; therefore it was re­quired that they should fulfil the contents of the order intrusted to the hands of Mahomed Ameen, the bearer, and rid themselves of their treacherous governor, for which they would be amply rewarded by the King. Mahomed Ameen, upon his arrival at the gates of Bunkapoor, sent word to Moos-tufa Khan, that he had brought a letter from the King; upon which he was admitted with great respect, and orders were given for his accom­modation. Pretending that it was late, he desired to be excused showing the mandate till the next morning; and Moostufa Khan, unsuspicious of treachery, took no notice of the delay. During the night, Mahomed Ameen showed the paper to the officers of the garrison, who seeing the King's order for the death of Moostufa Khan, agreed to put it into execution. Accordingly, while he was at prayers the following morning, a number of them rushed upon him, and strangled him with a bow-string.

When intelligence of this transaction reached Beejapoor, Chand Beeby was highly incensed, and expressed in bitter terms of reproach her disappro­bation of the conduct of Kishwur Khan. The minister for the present concealed his resentment against her; but in a short time accused her of having secretly instigated her brother, Moortuza Nizam Shah, to invade Beejapoor, and obtained the King's order to confine her for some time in the fortress of Satara. She was, accordingly, forced out of the haram, with many indignities, and sent prisoner to that place. After this measure Kishwur Khan became self-secure, and conducted affairs with uncontrolled authority. He sent Meean Buddoo Deccany, on whose fidelity he had reliance, to command on the frontiers, with instructions to seize, by treachery, most of the Abyssinian officers of the army, and to confine them in Shahdoorg. This design coming to the know­ledge of the intended victims, they resolved to seize Meean Buddoo, and then to remove Kishwur Khan. With this view, Yekhlass Khan, the prin­cipal Abyssinian chief, pretending that he had received news from Beejapoor of the birth of a son, made a grand entertainment, to which he invited Meean Buddoo, who, not suspecting his intentions, went to his tent, attended only by a few of his friends, and was made prisoner by the very same stratagem he had designed to practise. Yekhlass Khan, with all the chiefs, and the whole army, moved on the same day towards Bee-japoor; while Ein-ool-Moolk and Ankoos Khan, with such of the nobility as were friends to Kishwur Khan, deserted on the route to their several jageers.

Kishwur Khan, on hearing of this league against him, gave over all thoughts of opposition. To preserve appearances, however, as well as to pre­vent his being seized by the inhabitants of the city, he invited the young King to a feast at his own house; but as he attended him through the streets, the common people, and even the women, uttered loud exclamations of abuse against him, calling him the murderer of syuds * and the gaoler of Chand Beeby. The Regent, finding the minds of the populace incensed against him, thought it time to prepare for his escape. When he heard the army was arrived within a day's march of the city, he prevailed on the King to go with him, on pre­tence of hunting, to Koolabagh, one of the royal gardens; where, on his arrival, he expressed fears lest the heat of the sun should hurt his Majesty's health, and begged he would return to the palace, promising to follow himself, as soon as he had taken a view of the gardens of Shahpoor. The King returned agreeably to his request; when Kishwur Khan, who had a train of four hundred horse, among whom he had distributed his jewels and money, leaving his women and children behind in the city, took the road of Ahmudnuggur. On his arrival he found that court did not wish to afford him protection; on which he moved to­wards Golconda, the capital of Kootb Shah, where he was shortly after assassinated by one of the relatives of Moostufa Khan, in revenge for his treachery towards that nobleman.