His name is Sulān Bāyazīd, and his title Kātib-ul-Mulk (‘scribe of the kingdom’). It is probable that nobody in Hindūstān has written the nasta‘līq hand better than he, and he has reasonably good taste in poetry. At the end of his life he obtained grace to perform the pilgrimage of Islām. The following verses are by him:—

“At times thou art in my very soul, and at times in my
afflicted heart,
Such is thy levity that thou canst not remain in one
place.”

An ode.

“Had I not been pampered by union with thee,
I had never suffered so much now from parting with thee.*
²²⁸ The bird of my heart is burnt like a moth. Ah me!
Would that I had never fluttered around that candle which
illumines the night.
Had I not brought blood to my eyes with the arrow of her
eyelashes,
I had never become a mark for her heart-piercing arrow.”

A quatrain.

“Since my love has departed from my sight,
My heart's blood flows from my afflicted eyes.

She has gone from my sight but not gone from my heart.
Nay, surely this cannot be,
For that which goes from the sight goes from the heart.”

One of the Mīr's pupils in calligraphy, who was also one of the writer's companions, was Khẉāja Ibrāhīm Ḥusain the Aḥadī* (may God have mercy on him!), who was a well-born man of the city of Balū,* and closely related to Shaikh ‘Abd-ur Raḥmān the Balūī of Lāhor, who was, in his time, famed throughout the world as a religious leader and a follower of the saints. Khẉāja Ibrāhīm Ḥusain in the flower of his youth left this world of deceit for the abode of joy, to the infinite regret of his friends; and the writer suffered in one year, and within the space of a few days, the grief of losing him and the grief of losing Mīrzā Niām-ud-dīn Aḥmad,* and these griefs renewed my regret for the loss of my old friends—a regret which grows stronger every day.

Alas, I see no remedy for my pain!
I had some hope of union:—that is gone
All my concerns are languishing, because
I see that the promise of my friends is unfulfilled.

Alas! Misfortunes have crowded so thickly upon me that I have scarcely the strength left to bewail them. But what cause is there for bewailing, since we are all beneath one dome and have but to pass behind the veil to meet once more?

The following chronogram was composed on Khẉāja Ibrāhīm Ḥusain's death:—

229 “In accordance with the command of the Ruler of the
universe,
In the month of Ṣafar, Khẉāja Ibrāhīm Ḥusain
Journeyed from this world of wickedness and dishonour,
And the date of his death was found in the words,
‘Khẉāja Ibrāhīm Ḥusain.’”*