A band of mercenary soldiers occupied Rohilcund.  The Seiks ruled or the Indus.  The Jauts spread dismay along the Jumna.  The highlands which border on the western sea-coast of India poured forth a yet more formidable race, a race which was long the terror of every native power, and which, after many desperate and doubtful struggles, yielded only to the fortune and genius of England.  It was under the reign of Aurungzebe that this wild clan of plunderers first descended from their mountains; and soon after his death, every corner of his wide empire learned to tremble at the mighty name of the Mahrattas.  Many fertile viceroyalties were entirely subdued by them.  Their dominions stretched across the peninsula from sea to sea.  Mahratta captains reigned at Poonah, at Gualior, in Guzerat, in Berar, and in Tanjore.  Nor did they, though they had become great sovereigns, therefore cease to be freebooters.  They still retained the predatory habits of their forefathers.  Every region which was not subject to their rule was wasted by their incursions.  Wherever their kettle-drums were heard, the peasant threw his bag of rice on his shoulder, hid his small savings in his girdle, and fled with his wife and children to the mountains or the jungles, to the milder neighbourhood of the hyaena and the tiger.  Many provinces redeemed their harvests by the payment of an annual ransom.  Even the wretched phantom who still bore the imperial title stooped to pay this ignominious black-mail.  The camp-fires of one rapacious leader were seen from the walls of the palace of Delhi.  Another, at the head of his innumerable cavalry, descended year after year on the rice-fields of Bengal.  Even the European factors trembled for their magazines.  Less than a hundred years ago, it was thought necessary to fortify Calcutta against the horsemen of Berar, and the name of the Mahratta ditch still preserves the memory of the danger.

Wherever the viceroys of the Mogul retained authority they became sovereigns.  They might still acknowledge in words the superiority of the house of Tamerlane; as a Count of Flanders or a Duke of Burgundy might have acknowledged the superiority of the most helpless driveller among the later Carlovingians.  They might occasionally send to their titular sovereign a complimentary present, or solicit from him a title of honour.  In truth, however, they were no longer lieutenants removable at pleasure, but independent hereditary princes.  In this way originated those great Mussulman houses which formerly ruled Bengal and the Carnatic, and those which still, though in a state of vassalage, exercise some of the powers of royalty at Lucknow and Hyderabad.