. Wanderings east of Suez in Ceylon, India, China and Japan. ho did things was ShahJahan, and he came of a race not contentwith ordinary achievements. His grandfather,Akbar, was probably the greatest personage everbom in India. He it was whose saddle was histhrone, the canopy of which was the vaulted domeof heaven. Akbar made Eastern history, made itfast, blazoning it with proud records of conquestand empire extension. Akbar was the grandestman who ever ruled Central India, and it was hewho developed the Mogul Empire to the loftiestimportance it attained. Shah Jahan embellished the empire with
. Wanderings east of Suez in Ceylon, India, China and Japan. ho did things was ShahJahan, and he came of a race not contentwith ordinary achievements. His grandfather,Akbar, was probably the greatest personage everbom in India. He it was whose saddle was histhrone, the canopy of which was the vaulted domeof heaven. Akbar made Eastern history, made itfast, blazoning it with proud records of conquestand empire extension. Akbar was the grandestman who ever ruled Central India, and it was hewho developed the Mogul Empire to the loftiestimportance it attained. Shah Jahan embellished the empire with noblestructures, and his impulse for building amountedto mania. Time annulled Akbars achievements,but those of his grandson stand to-day, and thestructures of his era are beautiful enough to at-tract admirers from every comer of the earth. Afamous critic once said that Shah Jahan built likea giant and finished like a jeweler. His workshave made Agra, of all cities in India, the place ofunrivaled interest. Agras Taj Mahal is the most exquisite building 168. The Worlds Most Exquisite Building ever erected by the hands of man, and is a ro-mance as deftly wrought in marble as any writerever fashioned in words. It marks a great manslove for a woman—Arjamand Banu Begum, hiswife. Shah Jahan was a Mohammedan despotwho led a magnificent life, and had other wives;but in his eyes the peer of her sex was she died in giving birth to a child, he de-clared he would rear to her memory a mausoleumso perfect that it wooild make men marvel for alltime. And this he accomplished. More poetryand prose have been written about the Taj, withmore allusions to it as a symbol of love, than ofany other creation marking human affection—andthe secret probably lies in the fact that all theworld loves a lover. Arjamand had many titles oi rank and endear-ment, but poets like Sir Edwin Arnold preferredto speak of her as Mumtaz-i-Mahal, meaning theExalted of the Palace, when extolling thecharms
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