The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur). Emperor of Hindustan Babur
these three (Tīmūrid) Mīrzās and to read Khusrau Shāh’s name in the khut̤ba but he himself did not think this combination desirable. The ungratefulFol. 58b. manikin however, for the sake of gain in this five days’ fleeting world—it was not true to him nor will it be true to any man soever—seized that Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā whom he had seen grow up in his charge from childhood, whose guardian he had been, and blinded him with the lancet.
Some of the Mīrzā’s foster-brethren and friends of affection and old servants took him to Kesh intending to convey him to his (half)-brother Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā in Samarkand but as that party also (i.e. ‘Alī’s) became threatening, they fled with him, crossed the river at the Aūbāj ferry and went to Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā.
A hundred thousand curses light on him who planned and did a deed so horrible! Up to the very verge of Resurrection, let him who hears of this act of Khusrau Shāh, curse him; and may he who hearing, curses not, know cursing equally deserved!
This horrid deed done, Khusrau Shāh made Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā ruler in Ḥiṣār and dismissed him; Mīrān-shāh Mīrzā he despatched for Bāmīān with Sayyid Qāsim to help him.
904 AH.—AUG. 19th. 1498 to AUG. 8th. 1499 AD.432
(a. Bābur borrows Pashāghar and leaves Khujand.)
Twice we had moved out of Khujand, once for Andijān, once for Samarkand, and twice we had gone back to it because our work was not opened out.433 Khujand is a poor place; a man with 2 or 300 followers would have a hard time there; withFol. 59. what outlook would an ambitious man set himself down in it?
As it was our wish to return to Samarkand, we sent people to confer with Muḥammad Ḥusain Kūrkān Dūghlāt in Aūrā-tīpā and to ask of him the loan for the winter of Pashāghar where we might sit till it was practicable to make a move on Samarkand. He consenting, I rode out from Khujand for Pashāghar.
(Author’s note on Pashāghar.) Pashāghar is one of the villages of Yār-yīlāq; it had belonged to his Highness the Khwāja,434 but during recent interregna,435 it had become dependent on Muḥammad Ḥusain Mīrzā.
I had fever when we reached Zamīn, but spite of my fever we hurried off by the mountain road till we came over against Rabāt̤-i-khwāja, the head-quarters of the sub-governor of the Shavdār tūmān, where we hoped to take the garrison at unawares, set our ladders up and so get into the fort. We reached it at dawn, found its men on guard, turned back and rode without halt to Pashāghar. The pains and misery of fever notwithstanding, I had ridden 14 or 15 yīghāch (70 to 80 miles).
After a few days in Pashāghar, we appointed Ibrāhīm Sārū, Fol. 59b.Wais Lāgharī, Sherīm T̤aghāī and some of the household and braves to make an expedition amongst the Yār-yīlāq forts and get them into our hands. Yār-yīlāq, at that time was Sayyid Yūsuf Beg’s,436 he having remained in Samarkand at the exodus and been much favoured by Sl. ‘Ali Mīrzā. To manage the forts, Sayyid Yūsuf had sent his younger brother’s son, Aḥmad-i-yūsuf, now437 Governor of Sialkot, and Aḥmad-i-yūsuf was then in occupation. In the course of that winter, our begs and braves made the round, got possession of some of the forts peacefully, fought and took others, gained some by ruse and craft. In the whole of that district there is perhaps not a single village without its defences because of the Mughūls and the Aūzbegs. Meantime Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā became suspicious of Sayyid Yūsuf and his nephew on my account and dismissed both towards Khurāsān.
The winter passed in this sort of tug-of-war; with the oncoming heats,438 they sent Khwāja Yaḥya to treat with me, while they, urged on by the (Samarkand) army, marched out to near Shīrāz and Kabud. I may have had 200 or 300 soldiers (sipāhī); powerful foes were on my every side; Fortune had Fol. 60.not favoured me when I turned to Andijān; when I put a hand out for Samarkand, no work was opened out. Of necessity, some sort of terms were made and I went back from Pashāghar.
Khujand is a poor place; one beg would have a hard time in it; there we and our families and following had been for half a year439 and during the time the Musalmāns of the place had not been backward in bearing our charges and serving us to the best of their power. With what face could we go there again? and what, for his own part, could a man do there? ‘To what home to go? For what gain to stay?’440
In the end and with the same anxieties and uncertainty, we went to the summer-pastures in the south of Aūrā-tīpā. There we spent some days in amazement at our position, not knowing where to go or where to stay, our heads in a whirl. On one of those days, Khwāja Abū’l-makāram came to see me, he like me, a wanderer, driven from his home.441 He questioned us about our goings and stayings, about what had or had not been done and about our whole position. He was touched with compassion for our state and recited the fātiḥa for me before he left. I also was much touched; I pitied him.
(b. Bābur recovers Marghīnān.)
Near the Afternoon Prayer of that same day, a horseman appeared at the foot of the valley. He was a man named Yūl-chūq, presumably ‘Ali-dost T̤aghāī’s own servant, and had been sent with this written message, ‘Although many great misdeeds have had their rise in me, yet, if you will do me theFol. 60b. favour and kindness of coming to me, I hope to purge my offences and remove my reproach, by giving you Marghīnān and by my future submission and single-minded service.’
Such news! coming on such despair and whirl-of-mind! Off we hurried, that very hour—it was sun-set—without reflecting, without a moment’s delay, just as if for a sudden raid, straight for Marghīnān. From where we were to Marghīnān may have been 24 or 25 yīghāch of road.442 Through that night it was rushed without delaying anywhere, and on next day till at the Mid-day Prayer, halt was made at Tang-āb (Narrow-water), one of the villages of Khujand. There we cooled down our horses and gave them corn. We rode out again at beat of (twilight-) drum443 and on through that night till shoot of dawn, and through the next day till sunset, and on through that night till, just before dawn, we were one yīghāch from Marghīnān. Here Wais Beg and others represented to me with some anxiety what sort of an evil-doer ‘Ali-dost was. ‘No-one,’ they said, ‘has come and gone, time and again, between him and us; no terms and compact have been made; trusting to what are we going?’ In truth their fears were just! After waiting awhile to consult, we at last agreed that Fol. 61.reasonable as anxiety was, it ought to have been earlier; that there we were after coming three nights and two days without rest or halt; in what horse or in what man was any strength left?—from where we were, how could return be made? and, if made, where were we to go?—that, having come so far, on we must, and that nothing happens without God’s will. At this we left the matter and moved on, our trust set on Him.
At the Sunnat Prayer444 we reached Fort Marghīnān. ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī kept himself behind (arqa) the closed gate and asked for terms; these granted, he opened it. He did me obeisance between the (two) gates.445 After seeing him, we dismounted at a suitable house in the walled-town. With me, great and small, were 240 men.
As Aūzūn Ḥasan and Taṃbal had been tyrannical and oppressive, all the clans of the country were asking for me. We therefore, after two or three days spent in Marghīnān, joined to Qāsim Beg over a hundred men of the Pashāgharīs, the new retainers of Marghīnān and of ‘Alī-dost’s following, and sent them to bring over to me, by force or fair words, such hill-people of the south of Andijān as the Ashpārī, Tūrūqshār,Fol. 61b. Chīkrāk and others roundabout. Ibrāhīm Sārū and Wais Lāgharī and Sayyidī Qarā were also sent out, to cross the Khujand-water and, by whatever means, to induce the people on that side to turn their eyes to me.
Aūzūn Ḥasan and Taṃbal, for their parts, gathered together what soldiers and Mughūls they had and called up the men accustomed