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chap. xvii MIR JUMLA'S CAMPAIGN IN ASSAM 217
as
highly as he had been when Commander-in-Chief of the armies of
Aurangzeb, and all powerful in the Kingdom where he had a great number
of supporters. In order, therefore, to retain for himself the command
of the troops, he resolved to undertake the conquest of the Kingdom of
Assam, where he knew he would not meet with much resistance, the
country having had no war for 500 or 600 years, and the people being
without experience in arms.1 It is believed that this people
in ancient times, first discovered gunpowder and guns, which passed
from Assam to Pegu, and from Pegu to China ; this is the reason why the
discovery is generally ascribed to the Chinese. Mir Jumla brought back
from this war numerous iron guns, and the gunpowder made in that
country is excellent. Its grain is not long as in the Kingdom of
Bhutan, but is round and small like ours, and is much more effective
than the other powder.
Accordingly Mir Jumla left Dacca with a powerful army for the conquest of the Kingdom of Assam.2 At 5 leagues from Dacca one of the rivers which comes from the Lake of Chiamay,3
which like other rivers of India takes different names according to the
places it passes, joins an arm of the Ganges, and at the place where
these two rivers meet there are forts on each side, both armed with
good pieces of bronze cannon, which shoot at a level with the water.
This is where Mir Jumla embarked,1 his army ascending the river to the
1
Bernier (p. 171) says that Mir Jumla was sent to Assam because '
Aurangzeb justly apprehended that an ambitious soldier could not long
remain in a state of repose, and that, if disengaged from foreign war,
he would seek occasion to excite internal commotions.' Ostensibly he
was appointed Viceroy of Bengal to punish the lawless Zamïndâra of
Assam and Arakan (Jadunath Sarkar, History of Aurangzïb, iii. 178).
* On 1st November 1661. An account of Assam at the time of its conquest by Mir Jumla in 1663, based on the 'Âlamgïr-nâma of Muhammad Käzim-ibn-Muhammad Amin Munshi, by Kaviräj Syâmal Dâs, translated by Bäbü Rama Prasâda, has been published in the Indian Antiquari/ for July 1887, pp. 222-6. The authorities for the campaign are Elliot&Dowson, Hist. οf India, vii. 144; Asiatic Researches, ii. 172 ff. ; Jadunath Sarkar, iii. 166 fi.
3 Lake Chiamay was a myth believed in by early travellers. (Yule, Hobson-Jobson_ 190; Scott & Hardiman, Gazetteer of Upper Burma, Part ii, vol. ii, 659 f.)
' Gorâghât on the west bank of the Karatoyä river in the district
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