28 THE AGRARIAN SYSTEM OF MOSLEM INDIA 
the clerks of the Army Ministry, and so escaped the lability 
to serve; sons had been tacitly allowed to succeed their 
fathers; the holders lived in their villages as if they were 
proprietors; and a claim was now put forward that the 
holdings were Grants and not Assignments. The King 
passed orders on these reports, resuming the Assignments 
of those who were unfit for service, and giving them small 
pensions in cash, while the Assignments were continued to 
men who were able and willing to perform their duties; 
but subsequently these orders were cancelled on a picturesque 
appeal ad misericordiam, and we are left to infer that, in 
these particular cases, the Assignments were allowed to 
develop into Grants free from liability. 
The story is interesting for the light it throws on the 
agrarian position in the vicinity of Delhi. An individual 
trooper could apparently settle down _ quietly in a village, 
and enjoy the revenue it yielded; and, since these individuals 
obviously regarded their holdings as well worth keeping, 
we must infer that the peasants accepted the arrangement 
without much difficulty. The life of the village doubtless 
went on as before: the only novelty was the new revenue- 
collector who came to live in it, with the authority of the 
King behind him, but obviously with no great force at his 
own disposal. We may guess that in some cases there may 
have been friction due to the attitude of a particular as- 
signee; but the duration of the Assignments indicates that, 
in the thirteenth century, as in later times, the peasants 
were content to acquiesce in arrangements made over their 
heads, and pay the revenue to anyone who claimed it with 
authority. 
No similar account exists of the larger Assignments, that 
is to say, those held by men of position. Their existence 
is indicated, but that is all, and we do not know whether the 
position involved merely liability to personal service. as 
officers, as was the case in the fourteenth century, or whether 
it included also the maintenance of a body of troops, as was 
the rule in other Moslem countries at that time, and in 
India during the Mogul period. Taking a general view of 
the position, it is clear that Assignments were fairly common 
in the neighbourhood of Delhi: but in this region there was