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I served under him as a member of the Council
till I retired towards the end of 1929 ; and I found
him as gentle, affable and courteous as he had
always been. One of his noble characteristics
was that he was willing to work in concert and
friendly accord with his colleagues. Self-assertion
was unknown to him, for he had the refined
gentleman's inborn tact of guiding by silent sugges-
tion. He proved to be an excellent President,
and people regretted his retirement when the time
came for it in 1937. Sir William Barton who had
at first hesitated to agree to his selection, came to
acknowledge after three years' knowledge of him
and his ways that the selection had been more than
justified. In his speech at the farewell banquet
given to him by the Maharaja, he referred to him
and his pre-eminence among the Hyderabad
nobility by calling him " the last of the Moghuls/'
This was perhaps on the ground of his being one of
the last few noblemen in Hyderabad who re-
mained conscious of the fact that Hyderabad was a
princely State still reflecting, though faintly, the
glory of the Moghal name.
The Maharaja did not live very long after his
retirement. He died in 1940 at the age.of 76. His
life had been saddened towards the end by some
family troubles and anxiety as to the future.
As a man of high thoughts and liberal views
and broad sympathies, he was very tolerant in
j^ligious and social matters. Indeed so much
so that he made people think that he belonged to