The
Muhammadan Thugs, or assassins of India, certainly looked upon him as
one of the great founders of their system, and used to make
pilgrimages to his tomb as such; and, as he came originally from
Persia, and is considered by his greatest admirers to have been in
his youth a robber, it is not impossible that he may have been
originally one of the 'assassins', or disciples of the 'old man of
the mountains', and that he may have set up the system of Thuggee in
India and derived a great portion of his income from it.[13] Emperors
now prostrate themselves, and aspire to have their bones placed near
it [_scil._ the tomb]. While wandering about the ruins, I remarked to
one of the learned men of the place who attended us that it was
singular Tughlak's buildings should be so rude compared with those of
Iltutmish, who had reigned more than eighty years before him.[14]
'Not at all singular,' said he, 'was he not under the curse of the
holy saint Nizam-ud-din?' 'And what had the Emperor done to merit the
holy man's curse?' 'He had taken by force to employ upon his palaces
several of the masons whom the holy man was employing upon a church,'
said he.
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