The Ghakkars in appearance like the tribe of ‘Ād,* daily fought with the Afghāns, and by night entered their camp like thieves, and used to carry off whomsoever they might find, woman or man, freed man or slave, and keep them in bonds with the utmost rigour, and sell them. The Afghāns* dragged them in the dirt, and gave them the nickname of Ruswāī (disgraced), but no one had the power to represent this state of things to Islem Shāh till at last one day Shāh Muḥammad Farmalī,* who was one of the most noted Amīrs for wit and good-humour in Hindūstān, and was also a specially favoured and forward boon companion said, “My Lord the King! Last night I saw in a dream three bags descend from heaven, in one of which was dust, in another gold, and in the third* paper. The dust fell upon the head of a soldier, the gold went to the house of the Hindū daftarī,* and the paper remained in the royal treasury.” Islem Shāh was pleased with this speech, and promised that after his return to Gwāliār he would make his accountants draw up an account of the soldiers' pay, and pay them in gold. As it happened that order was never carried out, for in those same days death seized him by the collar.

Verse.

Attend to my wants to-day for that draught is of no avail
Which is given to Sohrāb after his death.

In the end, the affairs of the Nīyāzīs came to this, that when ^388. their strength* was broken, and they came into Kashmīr, the Kashmīrīs, who are* born traitors and deceivers, first of all invited the Nīyāzīs from Rājūrī after inflaming them with spurious ambition for kingdom, and in the end their guides leading them astray* brought the tribes of Kashmīr to oppose them, and at a hint from Islem Shāh held the head of the pass against them. The women even of the Nīyāzīs in defence of their honour girded on quivers, (among them were the mother and wife of Ā‘am Humāyūn),* and fighting with the Kashmīrīs were attacked by a hail of stones which literally covered them, and not a soul escaped. It is said that in the reign of Shīr Shāh a body of the Afghāns of the tribe of Sanbal invited the Nīyāzīs to Dhankoṭ under treaty, and put two thousand of them to death in obedience to the orders of Shīr Shāh, putting their wives and children to the sword. Five years later the same thing happened to them,* and in this house of retribution they received the reward of their deeds, hand for hand. And* in these narrow passes they put all three brothers to the sword, sending their heads as an offering to Salīm Shāh. They also sent for him a girl from there. A part of this story has been elegantly told in the Tārīkh-i-Kashmīr,* the composition of which is ancient thought its arrangement is modern; and at the time when Islem Shāh, had sent troops against the Ghakkars and the Jānoha party who were strongly entrenched on the banks of the river Behat, he himself was occupied in building the fortress of Māngaṛh;* and Kāmrān Mīrzā, after fighting many battles with* ^389. Muḥammad Humāyūn Padshāh, fled from Kābul and took refuge with Salīm Shāh, in the hopes that he would give him reinforce­ments which would enable him to capture Kābul, in the (vain) expectation that the water which had flowed away would return* to its source. When Islem Shāh heard this tidings, he selected from his army the notorious Humūn* Baqqāl, who in those days, in virtue of his capacity for extorting taxes, had been pro­moted from being overseer of the market to a post of confidence, and sent him with another body of Afghāns to the neighbourhood of Rohtās to meet Mīrzā, and although Islem Shāh in his own mind thought this a reason for increased confidence in Mīrzā, being led to this by the want of confidence* he had in the Afghāns as a tribe, and the entire trust he reposed in Humūn, still Mīrzā himself made light of this, and* recognising that there were dregs in the very first draught of the cup was unwilling to come in person.

Verse.

Now indeed thou repentest but thy repentance profiteth thee
nothing.

Nevertheless, in spite of this Mīrzā still believed that possibly Islem Shāh would overlook everything, and would treat him with honour and respect when the time of meeting arrived. However, on the day of public audience, he himself entered with arrogant assur­ance, and sitting on the seat of a Fara‘ūn or a Shaddād,* gave orders to Sarmast Khān* the Afghān, a Dā'ūd Za'i,* who held the office of Bārbak,* in accordance with which he directed Mīrzā to perform the customary salutations like the servants of the ordi­nary public. He accordingly performed the Kornish,* and those diabolical men* out of sheer inhumanity seized Mīrzā roughly by the nape of the neck, and shouted aloud several times saying, Your Majesty!* Be pleased to cast a glance hither, for Kāmrān the Muqaddam-zāda of Kābul invokes blessings. Islem Shāh after ignoring him for some considerable time, cast a haughty glance in the direction of Mīrzā,* and uttered a hypocritical ^390. “Welcome.” He then ordered a tent and canopy to be erected for Mīrzā near to his own tent, and bestowed upon him a horse and a robe of honour, and a slave girl and a eunuch so that they might spy into his affairs. He used also to summon the Mīrzā from time to time, and hold converse with him regarding poetry, but their intercourse was always disagreeable, and the Mīrzā was worried by those incessant ceremonial visits and shew of polite­ness, till he grew sick of his life, and was watching a favourable opportunity to make his escape. Moreover the Afghāns used to make jibes* at him in the Hindī tongue, and when he appeared in darbār used to say* Moro mī āyad* (Here comes the peacock). The Mīrzā enquired from one of the attendants, in the presence of Islem Shāh, “What do they mean by Moro?” He answered, “It is the name they give* to a man of great dignity.” The Mīrzā replied,* “At that rate Salīm Shāh is a first rate Moro and Shīr Shāh was a still finer.” Salīm Shāh consequently gave orders that no one was ever to use that word again,* nor to indulge in pleasantries at the Mīrzā's expense. At last one day Islem Shāh called upon the Mīrzā for a verse of poetry, when the Mīrzā recited this mala‘ off hand:

Gardish-i-gardūn-i-gardān gardanānrā gard kard
Bar sar-i-ṣāḥib-tamīzān nāqiṣān rā mard kard.* The revolutions of the circling heaven have brought low the
mighty,
And have made worthless men to lord it over men of intel­ligence.

Islem Shāh fully caught the meaning of this verse, and gave secret orders to his attendants to keep the Mīrzā under open arrest. The Mīrzā, however, by the help of the zamīndārs,* made an arrangement with one of the hill Rājas, and persuaded him, by holding out inducements of various kinds, to station post-horses along the banks of the river Chināb. One night he emerged from his tent with a woman's chādar* drawn over his head. The guards imagined that it was one of the women of his harīm and offered no interference. ^391.