When his life was attempted in ‘Irāq on account of his infidelity and intemperance, he fled thence to the Dakan, and afterwards came to Hindūstān. The Khān-i-Zamān sent him one thousand rupees for his expenses, and wrote from Jaunpūr a witty epigram’ which contained an enigma in the poet's name.

“O Ghazālī, I adjure thee by the claims of the lord of Najaf*
That thou come to the slaves of the peerless one!*
Since thou art without honour in that country*
Take thy head,* and come out of it.”

He was for some time with the Khān-i-Zamān and afterwards* entered the emperor's service and received the title of Maliku-sh-Shu‘arā.* He compiled several dīvāns and a book of manavīs. It is said that he has written no fewer than forty or fifty thousand couplets.* Although his compositions do not rank very high, yet his poems, as regards both quality and quantity, are superior to those of any of his contemporaries. He had great facility of ex­pression in the language of the mystics. He died very suddenly in Aḥmadābād on Friday, Rajab 27, A.H. 980 (Dec. 3, A.D. 1572),* ¹⁷¹ and his majesty ordered that he should be buried in Sarkhej,* the resting-place of many of the great saints and famous kings of old. Qāsim Arsalān* wrote this chronogram for the date of his death, taking it down from the dictation of Qāsim Kāhī.*

“Last night Ghazālī, that accursed dog,
Went drunk and defiled to hell.
Kāhī wrote the date of his death
‘A base infidel departed from this world.’”*

Another chronogram—

“Ghuzālī was a treasure-house of hidden meaning,
His resting-place is the pure earth of Sarkhej.
The date of his death, with the difference of one year only,
Is given by the words, ‘Aḥmadābād and the dust of
Sarkhej.’”*

The following is the opening couplet of an ode which I have not been able to discover in any dīvān written by him:—

“We heard a noise and opened our eyes from the sleep of
nothingness.
We saw that the night of strife had not passed away, and fell
asleep again.”*

Couplets by Ghazālī.

“If in the Ka‘bah thy heart wanders towards any, besides
(the Lord of the Ka‘bah).
The worship is all wickedness, and the Ka‘bāh is to thee no
more than an idol-temple.
But if thy heart is fixed on God, even though thou dwell in
the wineshop,
Drink wine fearlessly, thine end can be nought but good.”

“We fear not death, but this is our misfortune
That we must remain disappointed of regarding the lovely
ones of this world.”

“Those who are at rest in the dust were all slain by thy
sword.
The sword of Death has had no opportunity here.” ¹⁷²

“We are within the compass of a revolving lantern;* a whole
world remains in astonishment therein,
Man whirls madly therein like the figures on the lantern.”

“The zealot's cloak is stretched over his bent form like the
string on a bow,
But the debauchees fear not the arrows of his prayers.”

A Quatrain.

“My mind is an ocean which contains a gem,
My tongue is a sword which has an edge,
The clarion of my pen has the sound of the last trump,
I am the bird of the angels, my words are winged.”

He has introduced into one qaṣīdah all the numerals from one to a hundred. This is its opening couplet—

“By one word from thy two ruby lips Masīḥ* obtained three
favours;
Eternal life, and graceful speech, and power to give life.”
“We are wine, and round our necks is the collar of the wine-
jar,
We have a power of intoxication in which the whole world
is lost.”