48 THE AGRARIAN SYSTEM OF MOSLEM INDIA 
but not of those who succeeded in meeting their engage- 
ments, or who submitted to the penalty of failure ; and the 
nature of their relations with Chiefs and peasants is left 
to be imagined. 
The fate of the River Country during this reign must be 
told in some detail. Here, as elsewhere, the precise dates 
are sometimes uncertain, but the sequence of events can 
be traced: the story extends over nearly a quarter of a 
century, and the main features are—ruinous enhancement 
of revenue, loss of market, restriction of cultivation, re- 
bellion, drastic punishment, attempts at restoration de- 
leated by the failure of the rains, and, finally, a spectacular 
policy of reconstruction, ending in an almost complete 
fiasco. 
At the outset of his reign, Muhammad decided (p. 473) 
to enhance the revenue of the River Country, which was. 
in the main, reserved for the treasury. The enhancement 
was ruinous! in amount, the peasants were impoverished, 
and those of them who had any resources became dis- 
affected. Not long afterwards, the King carried out his 
plan of transferring the capital to Deogir in the Deccan, 
and in the year 1329 Delhi was evacuated by practically 
the entire population. The economic effect of this measure 
on the peasants in the River Country can be readily under- 
stood from a study of Aliuddin’s regulations. Delhi was 
the one large market for the surplus produce of the country, 
and when that market was summarily abolished, there would 
be no object in raising produce which could not be sold; in 
1 Barni, 473. The enhancement is described as yaki ba dah wa yaki ba 
bist. Mr. Ishwari Prasad rightly objects (Medieval India, 239%.) that 
Dowson’s rendering (Elliot, iii. 238) “fen or five per cent. more” does not 
explain the results which followed; while he observes, also rightly, that 
che alternative rendering, “ten or twenty times” is impossible if taken 
literally. The fact is that the phrase is rhetorical and not arithmetical; 
it is one of Ziya Barni’s favourite locutions, and he runs up and down 
the scale, ten-fold, 1oo-fold, 1000-fold, according to the humour of the 
moment, and not with any precise numerical significance. The idea of 
percentage is ruled out by such passages as that on P. 30, where an increase 
of “one to 100’’ brought tears to the spectators’ eyes, or that on p. 568, 
where it is said that the effect of irrigation will be to increase the cattle 
‘one to 1000.” Other passages are 84, 91, 109, 138, 294, 368, 394, 532; 
the list is not exhaustive, but it suffices to place the meaning of the phrase 
beyond doubt, as ‘‘huge,” “marvellous,” ‘“enormous,” or any rhetorical 
expression suited to the context