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Akbar and Bairám were marching on to the plains of Pánípat on the morning of the 5th of November, 1556, when they sighted the army of Hemu moving towards them. The thought must, I should think, have been present in the mind of the young prince that just thirty years before his grandfather, Bábar, had, on the same plain, struck down the house of Lodí, and won the empire of Hindustán.
His next act was to despatch the insignia of the empire with the Crown jewels, accompanied by the officers of the household, the Imperial Guards, and a possible rival to the throne in the person of a son of Humáyún's brother, Kámrán, to the head-quarters of the new Emperor in the Punjab. He then proceeded to take measures to secure the capital against the threatened attack of Hemu.
As Mánkót was very strong, and tidings of untoward events alike in Hindustán and Kábul reached them, the leaders contented themselves with leaving a force to blockade that fortress, and returned to Jálandhar. It was time indeed. Not only had Kábul revolted, but Hemu, his army increasing with every step, had taken Agra without striking a blow, and was pursuing the retreating garrison towards Delhi.
One of these arrows pierced the eye of Hemu, who fell back in his howdah, for the moment insensible. The fall of their leader spread consternation among the followers. The attack slackened, then ceased. The soldiers of Bairám soon converted the cessation into a rout. The elephant on which Hemu rode, without a driver for the driver had been killed made off instinctively towards the jungle.
The news of his father's death, I have said, reached Akbar as he was entering the town of Kálánaur at the head of his army. At the moment he had not heard of the revolt at Kábul, nor had his adviser, Bairám Khán, dwelt in his mind on the probability of a movement by Hemu against Delhi.
He urged a prompt march across the Sutlej, a junction with Tardí Beg in Sirhind, and an immediate attempt thence against Hemu. Delhi, he said, twice gained and twice lost, must at all hazards be won back. Delhi was the decisive point, not Kábul. Master of the former, one could easily recover the latter.
More than that, he had taken the precaution to despatch in advance a force of ten thousand horsemen, under the command of Álí Kulí Khán-í-Shaibání, the general who had fought with Tardí Beg against Hemu at Delhi, and who had condemned his too hasty retirement. Álí Kulí rode as far as Pánípat, and noting there the guns of Hemu's army, unsupported, he dashed upon them and captured them all.
He had, however, the good fortune to attach to his throne a Hindu, named Hemu, who, originally a shopkeeper of Rewárí, a town of Mewát, showed talents so considerable, that he was eventually allowed to concentrate in his own hands all the power of the State. The abilities of Hemu did not, however, prevent the break-up of the territories which Sher Sháh had bequeathed to his son.
Hemu had divided his army into three divisions. In front marched the five hundred elephants, each bestridden by an officer of rank, and led by Hemu, on his own favourite animal, in person.
But both Bairám and the other nobles of the court and army were not long kept in ignorance of the fact that in the son of Humáyún they had, not a boy who might be managed, but a master who would be obeyed. Akbar remained one month at Delhi. He sent thence a force into Mewát to pursue the broken army of Hemu and to gain the large amount of treasure it was conveying.
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