The Poet wandering on, through Arabie
And Persia, and the wild Carmanian waste,
And o'er the aërial mountains which pour down
Indus and Oxus from their icy caves,
In joy and exultation held his way;
Till in the vale of Cashmire, …
he stretched
His languid limbs.

—Alastor.

THE object of the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, as the author tells his readers, is to preserve the memory of the Moghuls and their Khans, which, at the time he wrote, stood in danger of being altogether lost through the want of a chronicler. It was a race that he knew to be not only declining, but speedily approaching an end: its power was a dream of the past; its numbers were dwindling at a rapid rate, chiefly through absorption into the neighbouring tribes then rising to influence; while he himself had been a witness of the events and an actor in the scenes, which had resulted in the remnant of his people being ousted from their own country, to find an asylum in a strange land. In short, the Moghuls of Moghulistan—the eastern branch of the Chaghatai—had been nearly blotted from existence, while their Khans, through a long course of intermarriage with other races, had ceased to be Moghuls in anything but the name. Mirza Haidar foresaw, therefore, that there might soon be nobody left to tell the story of a people who, only a few generations earlier, had regarded themselves with pride as the descendants of Chingiz's conquering hordes, who made them­selves feared if not respected, by their neighbours, and who gloried in the independence of the wide steppe-land which was their home. All this had been changed when our author— himself an exile and serving a foreign monarch—had to consti­tute himself the historian of their fall. Whether he was able to appreciate the changes that were taking place around him, where they did more than affect his own people, is perhaps doubtful. It may be supposed that he was regarding events from too close a standpoint to be able to judge of their true proportions; but it has become evident to later observers that he had, for the period of his history, a time of gradual but extensive change, which brought results of the greatest im­portance to the future of a large section of Asia. Mr. Erskine, the historian of the rise of the Moghul dynasty in India, has pointed to this period, as that which gave Transoxiana to the Uzbegs, Moghulistan to the Kirghiz, and India to the Moghuls —but to the descendants of a branch of the Moghuls quite separate from that of Moghulistan.*

In Central Asia it was a period full of incident: wars were on foot on every side: states were being overrun and cities besieged, while rulers arose or went down, almost from day to day, according to their fortune in war or intrigue. The princes and the descendants of exiled ruling families, together with most of the Khans and Begs of the various tribes, found themselves forced to take a side, either in support of their house or their relations, or in self-defence; and in many cases they seem to have changed sides with as little consideration for the rights and wrongs of the cause, as when they first took a part in the quarrel. When they were strong they attacked a neighbour with or without reason; if successful, they enjoyed, usually, a short period of bloody revenge and debauchery, but soon had again to “mount”—as the phrase was—for a new campaign; if beaten, they fled to some other neighbour, and if not put to death by him, waited, in exile, till a turn of fortune's wheel should afford a fresh chance of aggrandizement or plunder. “In the space of about 120 years,” writes Sir H. Yule, “no less than thirty descendants or kinsmen of Chaghatai are counted to have occupied his throne; and indeed revolutions, deposi­tions, murders, and usurpations seem to have succeeded each other with a frequency unusual even in Asiatic governments.”*

Here, then, were times that could hardly fail to make a historian of any soldier of fortune, who happened to have a taste for recording the events of his own life. Baber, the first of the Moghuls of India, and our author's cousin, especially answered to this description, and left behind him a picture of his age which is almost, if not quite, unique among the works of Asiatic authors. He has been represented as at once a soldier, a historian, and an autobiographer; and his kinsman, Mirza Haidar, may justly be described in the same way. Baber, however, was a better autobiographer than Mirza Haidar, and he was incomparably a greater soldier, as history proves. But, on the other hand, his cousin may be fairly acknowledged the better historian. While Baber made history incidental to his own memoirs, the reverse was the case with Mirza Haidar. The Mirza wrote the history of his race and family with a definite purpose; and when he came to his own days, he wove in his personal adventures as those of an actor and participator in the events he was recording—making the one illustrate the other; so that it may, with truth, be said that his life belongs to his history.

Though they differed in remote origin, Mirza Haidar was, to all intents and purposes, of the same nation and country as Baber; yet he wrote in Persian, while the latter wrote in the Chaghatai Turki (as the modern name is), current then, as now, all over Central Asia. Baber was a descendant of Amir Timur (or Tamerlane), and was, consequently, on one side of his family, more a Turk than a Moghul, for Timur belonged to the Barlás, a Turki tribe of distinguished lineage. Following the common usage of the day, however, Mirza Haidar would have called Baber a “Chaghatai,” while the latter would have spoken of his cousin as a “Moghul.” Mirza Haidar came of the Dughlát tribe—a sub-division, or sept, of the true Moghuls of Chagha-tai's line—and one that was accounted about equal, in point of nobility, to the Barlás. By the end of the fifteenth century the members of all the Moghul and Chaghatai ruling families had become much scattered, and mixed in blood, through frequent intermarriages with aliens. Many of them had, for several generations, lived in Turki countries, where they had become Turks in manners and language. So much was this the case with Baber and his kindred, that he had come to look upon himself as more of a Turk than a Moghul, and in his Memoirs mentions, more than once, his aversion and contempt for the Moghul race.* The Dughlát had remained more distinctively Moghul, though among its members, also, much intermixture with Turki tribes appears to have taken place. Thus the Turki in which Baber wrote his Memoirs, must have been the natural language of Mirza Haidar also, who probably knew little or nothing of the Moghul tongue, and in his capacity of Musulman, would have despised it as something appertaining to infidels and barbarians. But however this may be, when he wrote in Persian, he was certainly using a foreign language, and it is for this reason, perhaps, that his style is wanting in the simplicity which (it is said) characterises that of Turki writers—a sim­plicity that Baber loved, and impressed upon his son, Humayun, as an accomplishment to be cultivated.*

That the Tarikh-i-Rashidi was not written for effect, or for the indulgence of a taste for literature, need hardly be remarked after what has been said above. The work is an earnest one, and the author, no doubt intended that it should be, before everything else, a clear and complete exposition of the times he had set himself to chronicle. On the whole he has been suc­cessful, and has produced a record that, in point of usefulness, will bear comparison (as far as can be judged from translations) with most of those of Asiatic authors who have occupied them­selves in the same field, from the thirteenth century to the seven­teenth. * His task was not an easy one, for much of the history of the times is complicated and obscure, and would require infinite care and method to present it to the reader with perfect clear­ness. All was change and disorder. Princes and members of reigning families wandered and married in every direction, and their houses dovetailed into one another in a manner almost calculated to set at defiance any method of narration, however systematic: the limits of countries were nowhere fixed, while, unlike in any other part of the world, many of the nations dealt with were nomads, who sometimes migrated en masse from one region to another, or sometimes were found divided in their political subordination, as well as in their abodes. Even the names of the countries were not defined; and in some cases the tribe and the region it occupied, were confused under one name. In others, the country and the chief town were not distinguished; while in some, again, a place or a people might be known by different names to different neighbouring nations. The author who could construct from these confused materials an intelli­gible and fairly consecutive narrative, can scarcely be blamed if his reader should occasionally be perplexed in linking the various incidents together, or in distinguishing between some of the actors who took part in them. More especially should he be treated with leniency, when it is considered that what was clear to him at the time, and on the spot, must necessarily bear an entirely different complexion when viewed by the Western reader, after a lapse of more than three hundred years, and after all the changes that have taken place in the interval. It may be said that the art of the historian consists in over­coming these difficulties, and in leaving behind him a narrative that will be clear for all time; but this would be too much to expect from an Asiatic author, even though he might be an experienced writer, and not, as in Mirza Haidar's case, a roving adventurer or soldier of fortune, exposed to all the vicissitudes of the times. To the most practised among them, systematic arrangement and clearness of statement, as we understand the terms, are unknown, and even if they thought it worth while to consider the convenience of the readers they knew of, they could hardly have contemplated their works being studied by foreigners, from countries of which they had scarcely heard even the names.

Still, after making every allowance, it must be admitted that Mirza Haidar's book has its shortcomings, when viewed as a practical history. His flights of unmeaning rhetoric are, unfortunately, frequent, if scarcely so extravagant as those of most Persian writers. He constantly breaks out into verse, also, though he usually indulges in this form of ornament parenthetically—by way of declamation—and thus only in­terrupts the course of the narrative, while not marring its sense. His sentences, again, are often involved and his mean­ing not always apparent. This is more especially the case where he uses the ratio obliqua, and where he puts speeches into the mouths of his characters; but when he confines him­self to the direct relation of an event, such as the siege of Yangi-Hisar or the battle of Kanauj, his descriptive power is excellent, and the picture he presents is all that can be desired. On the whole, it may be said that for an author who takes credit to himself (as the Mirza does in his prologue) for being a past master in the art of making verses and in the “episto­lary style,” his writing is not obscure as Asiatic writings go; and though rather tedious repetitions are found in some of the historical sections, this is a fault on the right side, and causes less embarrassment than when gaps occur in the narrative.

These points relate more particularly to the author's style, but the chief imperfections in the work lie deeper. Perhaps those most to be deplored, are the weakness of the chronology and the looseness with which numbers and measurements are used. The former is a serious blemish, but as it is most marked in the early parts of the history, where the faults can be, to some extent rectified, by references to Chinese and other annals, it is not of vital consequence. A great part of his information having reached him by means of verbal tradition, passed down through three or four generations, the dates, above all, would tend to suffer; while, generally, it may be supposed that Mirza Haidar had scarcely realised, as did Sir Walter Scott, that “tradition is as frequently an inventor of fiction, as a preserver of truth.” The second defect is greatly to be regretted, as many interesting passages relating to military operations, the tribes, cities, ruins and curiosities are greatly diminished in value, from the want of accuracy in the figures recorded. The tendency, generally, it to exaggerate freely. A third, but less important deficiency, is the one partially alluded to above —i.e., the want of systematic arrangement into divisions, or sections, the absence of which is the cause of the frequent repetitions that occur, and the involution of one subject with another.

The scope and character of the Tarikh-i-Rashidi may be briefly summarised in much the same way as Dr. Charles Rieu, the learned Keeper of the Oriental Manuscripts at the British Museum, has described it in his official catalogue.* It may be regarded as the history of that branch of the Moghul Khans who separated themselves, about the year 1321, from the main stem of the Chaghatai, which was then the ruling dynasty in Transoxiana; and it is the only history known to exist of this branch of the Moghuls. The original, or western line—that of Transoxiana—was at that time declining in power, and through internal dissensions and administrative decay, was rapidly approaching a final dissolution. The princes of the branch then thrown off, became masters of Moghulistan (or Jatah, as it was called at that period) and of all Eastern Turkistan, and continued as a ruling dynasty for more than two and a half centuries. The book is divided into two parts, called Daftar, the first of which is entirely historical, while the second con­tains reminiscences of the author's life and notices of Chaghatai, Uzbeg and other princes, with whom he was acquainted.

The first Part, or history proper, was written in Kashmir in 1544 and 1545, and was completed about February, 1546, or five years after his installation as regent of that country. It includes, however, a later addition, in which 953 of the Hajra (4th March, 1546, to 21st February, 1547) is mentioned as the current year. For the earlier periods it deals with, it is based on the traditions handed down to the author chiefly by his older relatives, combined with the statements of Sharaf-ud-Din, Yazdi in the prolegomena of the Zafar-Náma; and, for the later periods, on his personal recollections. It contains a record of two distinct and parallel dynasties: (1) that of the Khans of Moghulistan, beginning with Tughluk Timur, who reigned from 1347 to 1362, and whose father, Isán Bugha, was the first to separate from the main Chaghatai stem; and (2) of their vassals, the Dughlát Amirs of Eastern Turkistan, one of the earliest of whom, Amir Bulaji, the author's ancestor, had raised Tughluk Timur to the Khanship. In the second period, the family of the Khans divided into two branches, one of which, superseding the Amirs of Kashghar (or Eastern Turkis-tan), continued to rule over Moghulistan proper and Eastern Turkistan, with their capital at Kashghar, while the other became rulers of the provinces eastward of Aksu (known as Uighuristan), and had their seat of government usually at Turfán. The author concludes his account of each with a short sketch of their reigning representatives, at the time of writing.

The second Part, which has more than twice the extent of the first, and contains Mirza Haidar's record of his life and times, was the first in point of date. The author wrote it in 1541-42, and, as he states in the Prologue, with a view to preparing himself for the more arduous task of historical compo­sition. * It begins with his birth and concludes with an account of his second invasion of Kashmir, when, by a battle fought on the 2nd August, 1541, he became master of the country. This Part includes also some rules of conduct for kings, drawn up at the request of the author, by his spiritual guide, Maulána Muhammad Kázi, whose death, in 1515, is recorded in the preceding passage; while another moral treatise by a holy Shaikh, Shaháb-ud-Din Mahmud, styled Khwája Nura, is inserted in full.*

The author is usually known as Mirza Haidar, and in this way he styles himself, though his full name and designation would be Mirza Muhammad Haidar, Dughlát, Kurkán. By some European writers, his usual appellation has been reversed, and he has become Haidar Mirza. In some parts of Asia the distinction would be a wide one; for when “Mirza” is placed before a name, it means merely “Mr.” or “Esq.,” and has about the same signification as the word “Khan,” when used by Persians of the better class, and by Hindustani Musulmans of all classes, at the present day. When placed after a name, it is equivalent to “Prince,” and is so used only by persons belonging to a reigning family. In the case of our author either would be suitable, seeing that he was a prince of the branch of Moghul Khans who were, at that time, rulers of the Kashghar province. But his grandfather, who had been one of these rulers, had borne the same names, and seems always to have been styled with the word Mirza at the end—Muhammad Haidar Mirza. It may be as well, therefore, to draw as clear a distinction as possible between him and his grandson. The latter tells us, too, that he was known to his associates by the style of Mirza Haidar, and as he himself uses it, the words may safely be placed in that order.

In recording his own descent, Mirza Haidar describes him­self as the son of Muhammad Husain Kurkán, son of Muham­mad Haidar Kurkán, son of Amir-i-Kabir Said Ali, son of Amir Ahmad, son of Khudaidad, son of Amir Bulaji. He was born in the year of the Hajra 905 (1499-1500 A.D.)* at Tashkand, the capital of the province then known as Shásh, where his father, Husain, had been made governor some six years before, by Mahmud, the titular Khan of Moghulistan and Kashghar. The others named in the pedigree were all Amirs of Kashghar, while the earliest of them, Bulaji of the Dughlát tribe, is remembered as being the first of the line to become a Musul-man. It was on the side of his mother, Khub Nigár Khánim, that our author was related to the Emperor Baber. She was a daughter of Yunus, Khan of the Moghuls, and a younger sister of Kutlugh Nigár Khánim, the mother of Baber.*

Mirza Haidar began his life in the midst of strife and adventures. His father—a treacherous and intriguing man— had been convicted of a mischievous plot against Baber at Kabul, but had been pardoned on account of his blood relation­ship. Shortly afterwards he had fallen into the hands of Shahi Beg Khan (otherwise Shaibani Khan), the Uzbeg leader, and had incurred that chief's suspicion also; but once more he was permitted to escape, and repaired to Herat, then the capital of Khorasán. His intriguing nature, however, being thought by Shahi Beg to be dangerous even at a distance, he caused him to be put to death there, after a short time, by emissaries whom he sent for the purpose from Transoxiana. Muhammad Husain had taken with him into exile some members of his family, among whom was our author, then quite a child; and it appears that after his father's murder, some of the retainers of the family, believing the son to be doomed to a similar fate, had carried him off to Bokhara, and had placed him in concealment there. In 1508, when about nine years of age, he was taken in charge by one of these faithful friends, called Maulána Muhammad (formerly his father's khálifa, or religious guide) who determined to save the child from the death that awaited him at the hands of the relentless Uzbegs, and contrived to escape with him from the city. After a difficult and exciting flight across the hill tracts of Khatlán and Kuláb, in the course of which they several times narrowly escaped falling into the hands of hostile Uzbegs, they succeeded in crossing the Oxus into Badakhshán. Here one Khan Mirza, a cousin and depen­dent of Baber, was at the time the reigning chief, with his capital at Kila Zafar on the Kokcha. He received the fugitives with kindness, and they remained a year with him, when Baber sent to summon them to Kabul. On their arrival, Mirza Haidar was made a member of the Emperor's household, and seems to have been treated with much consideration. Within a few months, however, Baber had to march northwards against the Uzbegs, whose main force was then at Hisar, and his young cousin accompanied the army. The next two years were stirring times, and Mirza Haidar, if not too young, must have learned much of warfare, as it was conducted in those days in Central Asia.

Baber's first two attempts on Hisar failed, but, on being joined by a large body of Persians from Khorasán, his third advance resulted in a victory which gained him the possession of Kunduz, Khatlán, and Khuzár. Taking advantage of the reputation they had established, and of the defeat and death of Shahi Beg, which had just then (1510) taken place in a battle with the Persians near Merv, the allies lost little time in making an attempt on Samarkand, the capital of Transoxiana. They marched first on Bokhara, where the inhabitants opened their gates to them, and afterwards to Samarkand, which they found undefended, the Uzbeg leaders having fled on their approach. Here Baber was received with enthusiasm by the people, and was virtually master, for a time, of the greater part of Central Asia. With his young guest in his following, he remained in Samarkand for some months, when a strong com­bination of Uzbeg tribes, compelled him and his Persian allies once more to take the field—though this time with very different results. They advanced against Bokhara, which had in the meantime been seized by the Uzbegs, but were repulsed, and shortly afterwards were disastrously defeated at the battle of Ghajdiwán, some distance to the north of the city. The alliance with the Persians came to an end and Baber retreated to Hisar, where he was surprised by an attack made by a body of Moghuls in the service of the Uzbegs, and again experienced a crushing defeat. He then retired to Kabul, but Mirza Haidar had now left him. After the retreat from Samarkand, his uncle, Sultan Ahmad, the Khan of Moghulistan, having written several times to ask Baber's permission for the boy to be sent to him, at last obtained it, and Mirza Haidar, “led away by youthful impatience,” as he himself writes, availed himself of the Emperor's consent, unwillingly given, and followed his uncle to Andiján, then the capital of Farghána.

It was about the beginning of the year 1514 that Mirza Haidar arrived at Andiján, and almost immediately afterwards entered the service of his kinsman Sultan Said Khan (the son of Sultan Ahmad), who had just then been conducting an expedi­tion against the Uzbegs in Tashkand, but had returned to Andiján on the enemy evacuating their positions. During the following summer, however, the Uzbegs recovered themselves and marched with a large force to lay siege to the Farghána capital. Sultan Said convened a council of his chiefs, who were unanimously of opinion that they were unable, without allies, to contend against the power of the Uzbegs; they believed them­selves to have a fairer chance of success by undertaking an invasion of Kashghar, and wresting that province from Mirza Abá Bakr, who then held it. This resolution was accordingly adopted, and before the Uzbegs had time to enter the country, the Khan with all his Amirs, their families and baggage, set out from Andiján and advanced towards Kashghar, by a route leading through Moghulistan. This Mirza Abá Bakr was of the line of Dughlát Amirs, and was regarded by the Khans of Moghulistan as a usurper. He was an active and able soldier, though a cruel tyrant, and during his long rule, had made him­self master of nearly the whole of Eastern Turkistan, besides several of the neighbouring countries. In 1511 he had invaded Farghána, but had there received a check by coming into con­flict with Sultan Said, from whose forces he experieneed a severe defeat at the battle of Tutluk, near Andiján. It was this victory over the usurper, that emboldened Sultan Said and his Amirs to attack him again in his own stronghold. Their enter­prise resulted in a complete success: Kashghar was taken in 1514, while Yangi-Hisar, Yarkand, and the remainder of the cities of Eastern Turkistan fell shortly afterwards. Abá Bakr, driven an exile to Ladak, was murdered on the road, and the line of Moghul Khans was re-established in Moghulistan and Eastern Turkistan.

Mirza Haidar, though now only fifteen years of age, was raised by his cousin the Khan to a high position, and his life of activity may be said to have begun about this time. For the ensuing nineteen years, during which Sultan Said's reign lasted, the Mirza served him in various capacities, but chiefly as a soldier; and it was only after the Khan's death, which occurred while returning from an expedition against Ladak in 1533, that he abandoned Kashghar and transferred his services to the Chaghatais in India. He not only took part in Sultan Said's wars against the Kirghiz and Uzbegs in Moghulistan, and against other tribal enemies, but was entrusted with important com­mands on distant expeditions. The first of these was an invasion of the hill country, then known as Bilur, or Bolor, in 1527. The expedition was nominally under the command of the Khan's eldest son, Rashid Sultan, but seeing that our author acted as a sort of tutor, or governor, to this young prince, it seems that he had much to do with the conduct of the campaign. Bolor may be described, roughly, as all the small hill states lying south of the Hindu Kush, between Baltistan on the east and Afghanistan on the west—as the limits of these countries are now accepted. Thus it included Hunza, Gilgit, Chitral, and probably most of the petty states sometimes known as “Yághistan.” There appears to have been no cause for the invasion, other than that the inhabitants were not Musulmans; but considerations of this kind did not weigh with the Central Asian Khans, and Sultan Said, as the author tells us, had always been ambitious of gaining glory by waging wars against “infidels.” The Bolor states were accordingly overrun and plundered during a whole winter, and the expe­dition returned to Kashghar in the following spring.

In 1529-30 the Khan undertook, in person, a campaign against Badakhshán, but sent Mirza Haidar in advance to begin opera­tions. The Mirza records that he laid waste the environs of the chief town, Kila Zafar, and when the Khan arrived, his men had only to carry off what little had been left. The object of this expedition was to gain possession of the districts on the Upper Oxus—Wakhán, Shighnán, etc.—which had been con­quered by the late Mirza Abá Bakr, and which Sultan Said, in consequence, considered himself the heir to. But the chief of Badakhshán was a relation and nominee of Baber, who took a view of the matter entirely opposed to that of Sultan Said, and threatened to support the chief. As Baber had now recovered, in India, the influence he had lost in Transoxiana, a letter from him to the aggressive Sultan Said, seems to have been sufficient to cause the Kashghar forces to be withdrawn across the Pamirs.

But it was in 1531 that Mirza Haidar undertook his most important service for Sultan Said Khan. This was the invasion, first of Ladak, then of Kashmir and Baltistan, and afterwards of Tibet proper, or the country known to Europeans under that name* —an invasion as culpably aggressive as the raid into the Bolor states. There was much paganism, he tells us, in Tibet, and the Khan, always animated by a love of Islam and a desire to carry on holy wars, was led by his pious aspirations to conquer that infidel country. It was not the first time that Ladak had been wantonly overrun from the side of Turkistan. Mirza Abá Bakr, during his long reign, had once at least, carried his arms into Ladak, while it would appear, from what Mirza Haidar records, that several parties had been sent to plunder the country since the accession of his patron, Sultan Said, to the Khanate. Very little is known of these earlier invasions, beyond the mere mention of them by Mirza Haidar, and by the author of the Haft Iklim,* who, however, obviously derived his information from the Tarikh-i-Rashidi. That all were unprovoked and prompted by a mere craving for plunder, however disguised under the mask of religious zeal, may be assumed with moderate confidence. None of them, including that of Sultan Said and Mirza Haidar, appear to have prospered, or to have made much impression on the inhabitants, who have preserved their old religion and manners to the present day; and though they have, in modern times, fallen politically under the Hindu yoke of the Dogras, they still keep up their ancient connection with Lassa, in all matters concerning their Buddhism and social customs. As Mirza Haidar says little about the fighting in Ladak, it is probable that the inhabitants offered only a feeble military opposition to the invaders, but trusted rather to the rugged nature of their country, the severity of the climate, and to the weapon common to most of the yellow races—passive resistance—to free them eventually from their enemy. And they were indeed successful. After subduing Ladak, a rapid march was made into Kashmir, where, to begin with, some easy victories were won, but treachery and discon­tent having appeared in the Moghul camp, Mirza Haidar had, after a few months' occupation, to fall back on Ladak, leaving Kashmir, to all intents and purposes, independent.

Sultan Said Khan, hoping to share in the glories of the “holy war,” had followed his lieutenant into Ladak, but his constitution, undermined by excessive drinking, proved less vigorous than his religious zeal, and the attenuated air of the Ladak passes had nearly proved fatal to him on the journey across. He recovered, however, sufficiently to lead a portion of his force into Baltistan, while Mirza Haidar was engaged in Kashmir, but after passing a winter there, distracted by cold and hunger, he too had to retreat into Ladak, and very shortly afterwards, set out on his return to Kashghar with a portion of the army. This second journey across the heights, achieved for him what the first had so nearly accomplished. He died on the Suget Pass, from the malady known as “damgiri,” or mountain sickness, and was at once succeeded by his eldest son, Abdur Rashid.

The death of the Khan in no way checked the course of the “holy war,” for his second son, Iskandar Sultan, and many other Amirs, remained with Mirza Haidar, who now (July, 1533) started on an expedition to “earn merit” by destroying the great temple at Lassa—an exploit, he tells his readers, that had never been achieved by any King of Islám. He appears to have marched for about a month's journey towards the south­east, over some of the highest table-lands in Asia, to the region which gives rise to most of the great rivers of India, and to within a few days' journey of the Tibetan border of Nipal. His total force is nowhere stated in figures, and apparently it was divided into at least two, or perhaps three, columns. One of these was attacked by a force of “men armed with short swords,” sent by “a Rai of Hind” to the assistance of the Tibetans—a statement that appears to point to a body of Nipali tribesmen, armed with their national weapon, the kukri. The inference is that the Moghuls were beaten in at least one fight with these people. Yet Mirza Haidar continued his march towards the capital, until he arrived at, and plundered, a place he calls Astábrak (or Astákbark), which was repre­sented as being within eight days' journey of Lassa. No map or book of any date, now available, seems to contain this name or any variant of it, but if the estimate of eight marches from Lassa be correct, and these marches are intended for the long Tibetan post-stages, the invaders would still have been some 300 miles, or more, distant from their goal. However this may be, the mortality among his horses, want of supplies, and the general distress caused by cold and the high elevation, obliged the Mirza to abandon his enterprise at this point, and to set out in retreat towards Ladak. His experience, indeed, was almost exactly that of the Dogra general Zoráwar Sing who, in 1841, made an attempt to conquer the western provinces of Tibet for his master, Rájah Guláb Sing of Kashmir. Of fighting there was little in either case, except against the climate and conditions of the country, and in both instances these adversaries proved victorious.

In the early months of 1534 Mirza Haidar returned defeated, and with a mere remnant of his force, to a position of safety in Ladak. Of those who were left even, many deserted him here to find their way back to their homes across the mountains. Yet, broken and almost helpless as he was, the chiefs of Upper Ladak received him and his men with hospitality, and even assisted him in getting together a force with which, the next year, he proceeded to attack and plunder the western districts of the country, known as Purik, Suru, and Zangskar. His success in all these forays was very doubtful. He seems to have been able to do little more, during the first year, than keep his men and animals from starving, while in the second year (1535) he had again, from sheer distress, to fall back on the neighbourhood of Leh and throw himself on the mercy of the strangely tolerant Ladak chiefs. His followers, under these conditions, became discontented if not mutinous, and began to desert him; while he received such evil tidings from Kashghar, that the “holy war” against the Tibetans at length came to an end.

Rashid Sultan (otherwise Abdur Rashid Khan) had begun his reign at Kashghar, by putting to death many of his own relations, and among them the author's uncle, Sayyid Muham­mad Mirza, whom he suspected of plotting against him in favour of the late Khan's younger son, Iskandar. These events seem to have made a deep impression on Mirza Haidar's mind, for he alludes to them with bitterness, more than once in the course of his narrative. His uncle had served Sultan Said faith­fully for many years, and had done much arduous work for him, while Mirza Haidar himself had been the chief agent in extending the Khan's kingdom and power. But besides this, he had been companion and instructor to two of the Khan's sons, and when the elder of these marked the commencement of his reign by acts of ingratitude and bloodshed, it is scarcely surprising that he should be deeply hurt, and should record his feelings, years afterwards, in his history.

Hence, fearing that he might meet with the same treatment as his uncle and others of his family, if he returned to Kash-ghar, he had to seek for a refuge. It was impossible to stay longer in Ladak, while all the direct roads to India and Kabul were in the hands of those whom he had lately been chastising and plundering, in the name of religion. With the daring of despair, he determined to try and reach Badakhshán with the handful of adherents that remained in his service, by turning off from the usual track between Ladak and Yarkand, at a point called Ak-Tagh, to the north of the Karakorum Pass; and after following the course of the Yarkand river for some distance, to gain Ráskám, the southern Pamirs, and Wakhán. This adventure—apparently almost hopeless under the conditions in which he attempted it—he accomplished successfully, accom­panied by about twenty followers, though not without much hardship and suffering. The winter of 1536-7 he spent in Badakhshán, the following summer he repaired to Kabul, and shortly after to Lahore, where he was received by Baber's son, Kámrán Mirza, and found himself, as he tells us, raised from the depths of distress to honour and dignity.

Kámrán was at that time engaged in a struggle for territory with the Persians, and had, soon after our author's arrival, to proceed to the relief of Kandahar, which was being besieged by Sám Mirza and by Shah Tahmásp, the sons of Shah Ismail, the Safavi; but before setting out he appointed his guest to the governorship of those parts of India (the whole of the Punjab) which belonged to him, and in this capacity Mirza Haidar resided for over a year at Lahore, “collecting taxes, suppress­ing revolt, protecting the frontiers, and establishing Islám.” It was shortly after Kámrán's return to the Punjab, (1538) that Humayun had sustained a severe defeat in Bengal at the hands of Shir Sháh Sur, the Afghán leader, who was now advancing towards Agra by the left bank of the Ganges. A large part of Humayun's army having accompanied him to Bengal, he made an appeal to Kámrán and his other brothers to send assistance to Agra, while he himself hurried northward. Kámrán, after some hesitation, consented, and moved first to Delhi and then to Agra, with an army of 20,000 men, and in company with our author. Here dissensions took place among the brothers; Kámrán repented of his decision to support the Emperor, and putting forward bad health as a reason, determined to return to Lahore, while Shir Shah was yet on the far side of the Ganges. He endeavoured to persuade Mirza Haidar to return with him, but the Mirza declined on patriotic grounds, and from that time forward (1539) became an adherent of Huma-yun, who treated him with great honour and called him “brother, after the Moghul fashion.”

The disastrous battle of Kanauj soon followed.* Humayun's force numbered some 40,000, but was less an army than a huge undisciplined mass, commanded by Amirs who had no intention of fighting the Afghans. Mirza Haidar appears to have acted as a kind of general adviser or chief of the Emperor's staff, but he mentions incidentally that he also led the centre division.* The confusion and corruption that prevailed on the side of the Chaghatais he describes with much candour, and clearly shows that the battle was lost before it had been fought. Whatever his position in the army may have been, he seems to have done his best to advise and support his master, and finally joined him in his flight to Agra,* and thence to Lahore. His narrative gives, in a few words, a vivid picture of the crowd of refugees that were assembled at the Punjab capital, their state of panic, and the divided and interested counsels with which the Em­peror was perplexed. Mirza Haidar advised that the Chaghatai Amirs should occupy separate positions along the lower hills, from Sirhind to the Salt Range, where the army might be re­organised in safety and, on a favourable opportunity presenting itself, might be used with effect to regain possession of India. He himself would undertake the reduction of Kashmir, a task he hoped to accomplish in so short a time that the Emperor and his brothers might send their families thither, and secure, for them at least, a refuge from all enemies. But the Mirza's advice was of no avail; for though Humayun seems to have been inclined to listen, he was overborne by other councillors.

While acting at Lahore as Kámrán's delegate, Mirza Haidar had been approached by certain chiefs of Kashmir who were at variance with the native prince then reigning in their country, and who, on being worsted by him, had found a refuge in the Punjab. They endeavoured to procure, through Mirza Haidar's influence, the assistance of a body of Kámrán's troops, to invade their own country and expel the obnoxious ruler. The scheme seems to have commended itself to the Mirza's judgment, and after some delay he was able to gather a respectable force, which he placed under the command of one Bába Chuchak, one of the most experienced officers in the service of Kámrán, with in­structions to accompany the Kashmiri chiefs and restore them to the possession of their State. The Bába, however, found pretexts for evading the execution of these orders, and the expedition proved a failure. After the retreat of the Chaghatais from Kanauj to Lahore, these chiefs renewed their appeals for assistance, and it was during the discussions that took place there as to the general line of action to be adopted, that Mirza Haidar impressed on Humayun the advantage of seizing the opportunity to gain a footing in Kashmir. He had learned from his previous incursion into that country, while in the service of the Khan of Kashghar, the value of its position and resources, and calculated that, with a reasonable force, he would require only two months to subjugate it and make it a suitable asylum for the Emperor and his family, together, if necessary, with the remains of the Chaghatai army. Shir Shah, on the other hand, with the wheeled carriages and the artillery, on which his strength mainly depended, would not, the Mirza reckoned, be able to reach the outer hills in less than four months, and his troops would be exhausted by the effort.

Though these plans were not taken advantage of by Humayun (who continued his retreat to the Indus), he permitted them to be put into practice by Mirza Haidar. The Mirza was given a small body of troops, and was sent forward from Lahore to join the Kashmiri chiefs, in whose company he was to enter the hills of their country, and to be followed, at intervals, by two of Humayun's officers, called respectively Iskandar Tupchi and Khwája Kalán. When all had assembled above Jhilam, and the force had begun to ascend the passes leading to the valley of Kashmir, dissensions arose among the commanders. Khwája Kalán, with his men, first separated himself from the expedition, and the Tupchi shortly afterwards followed him, leaving Mirza Haidar to prosecute the undertaking with no more than a handful of retainers in his own pay, and a few more who had joined him on the personal authority of the Emperor. With this following he determined to advance, and on the 21st November, 1540, crossed the Punch pass and descended into the valley. His calculations proved correct: he met with no resistance from the chiefs or people, but obtained possession of the country without striking a blow.

It is curious how little our author relates about his invasion and administration of Kashmir, or of the affairs of that country during the eleven years that his regency lasted. He was to all intents and purposes king of the State; while the value of the territory and the importance of its position, from a military point of view, at the juncture when he found himself its ruler, were well known to him, for he had impressed them urgently on Humayun only a short time before. Yet all he has to say of the period is summed up in two short chapters at the end of his history; though he devotes much more space to the events that were happening at the time across the passes. It was in Kashghar and Yarkand that his nearest relatives and his friends were living—most of them in suffering and danger—and that his political enemies were ruling, on lines that he regarded as dangerous, and subversive of the power and prosperity that he had himself helped to build up. It seems evident, indeed, that to the end of his life, his mind was chiefly occupied with the affairs of what may be called his own country, and communica­tions between his friends and himself seem to have been kept up to the last, while he felt himself to be more or less an exile in Kashmir. So meagre is his story of this period of his life, and so abruptly broken off, that from the year 1540 on­wards, I have had to follow chiefly the accounts of Abul Fazl, the historian of Akbar, and of Firishta. Both of these authors wrote within an interval not very remote from that which they chronicle, so that the events they deal with must have been fresh in the memories of their informants.*

Kashmir had, for some time previously, acknowledged no one supreme ruler, except those set up as mere nominal represen­tatives of the old line of kings. Several native chiefs exercised the real authority, in various parts, and at that particular time were supporting, as a pageant, a prince whose title was Názuk Shah.* Whether Mirza Haidar began by joining issue with this personage we are not informed, but it appears rather, that he took him under his protection. It is related, however, that one Káchi Chak, the principal of those chiefs through whose representations Mirza Haidar had been originally induced to undertake the reduction of the State, very shortly deserted his benefactor. He perceived, says Abul Fazl, that his own schemes would be defeated by the establishment of Mirza Hai-dar's power, and “with the natural perfidy inherent in the character of the Kashmirians, suddenly withdrew from the country to seek the protection of Shir Khan”* [i.e. Shir Shah]; with the result that a force of 2,000 Afghans was immediately despatched by the Shah, to conduct the petitioner back to his country. A threat of invasion by Shir Shah and his Afghans was sufficient to deprive Mirza Haidar of all his Kashmiri allies, and he had to retire to an inaccessible part of the country, with a few of his own followers, where he led a precarious and unsettled life for about three months. At last, on the 2nd August, 1541 (8 Rabi II. 948 H.) he gave battle to his enemies, who were computed at 5,000 combatants (including natives and auxiliary Afghans), and defeated them with great loss, the Afghans retiring to Delhi, while the Kashmiri malcontents fled to the outer hills. By this victory, our author rendered himself undisputed master of the whole of Kashmir.

A period of tranquillity followed, but was destined to last only till the year 1543, when the fugitives beyond the borders, having combined their forces with those of some of their rela­tives, marched on Srinagar for the purpose of subverting Mirza Haidar's government. They were completely routed, however, and again took refuge in the outer hills. Not long afterwards, the Mirza himself took the offensive against Ladak, and is said to have reduced several of its districts to subjection. Only one of these is named by Firishta, who writes it “Looshoo”—a name impossible to identify, unless it can be regarded as a corruption of “Suru.” During his absence on this expedition, an epidemic disease broke out, which carried off the three discontented chiefs who had, up to that time, been his most persistent opponents. Their removal afforded him again a period of peace, which lasted for about two years, when he proceeded to attack the province of Kishtawár. One Bandagán Koka was sent forward in command of a portion of the force, while Mirza Haidar followed at a distance. Bandagán Koka came up with the enemy on the banks of the Kishtawár river, and after two engagements, was defeated and killed, together with a number of his men. The remainder of his force fell back on the divi­sion of the Mirza, who, however, does not appear to have followed up his intention of subduing the province. The next year, 1548, he is reported to have turned his attention first towards Little Tibet (or Baltistan), then to Tibet (or Ladak) again, and subsequently to Rajaori and Pakhli. In all these provinces he is said to have succeeded in his objects, and to have added them, finally, to his Kashmir dominions.

In 1549 an occurrence is recorded, which nearly brought our author once more into conflict with the Afghans of Hindustan. In 1545 Shir Shah had been succeeded by his son, Islám Shah (otherwise known as Salim Khan), against whose rule the Niázi tribe of Afghans, then settled in the Punjab, rose in rebellion. After being worsted by Salim in the plains, they fled towards the hills and took refuge in the Kashmir province of Rajaori. Here they were received by the descendants of those Kashmiri chiefs, who had so persistently opposed Mirza Haidar's rule, up to a few years previously. Intrigues were entered into between these and the Niázi, but in the meantime Salim, pursuing the latter, arrived at the foot of the hills near Nau Shahra in Rajaori, while Mirza Haidar advanced to block the road from the side of Kashmir. According to Firishta, a peaceful arrange­ment was come to between the various parties; Salim was appeased on certain hostages being made over to him, and returned to Delhi, while the Kashmiri partisans, abandoning their plans, some joined Mirza Haidar, and others accompanied Salim to his capital. A different version of this affair (it may be noted) is given by Abdulla, the author of the Tarikh-i-Daudi, who records that a fight took place between the Niázi and a force sent by Mirza Haidar to prevent them from entering Kashmir, and the writer locates this encounter, not in Rajaori, but in the district of Banihál. The Kashmiri force is represented as gaining a complete victory, while Mirza Haidar is said to have propitiated Salim Khan, by sending him the heads of the slain Niázi as a peace-offering. Which of these two accounts is the more correct, it is not easy to judge, but it seems that Mirza Haidar had, about this time, some transactions with the Afghan Shah of Hindustan, and may possibly have felt it necessary to propitiate him. At any rate, Firishta relates that he sent ambassadors with presents to Delhi in 1550, and that Salim, in return, deputed an envoy with horses, muslins, etc., to Srinagar. What brought about this exchange of courtesies, or what came of it, the historian does not state.

In the same way, the events of the ensuing year, 1551, relating to Mirza Haidar's death, are to some extent at variance. The only two historians (as far as I am aware) who record them in any detail are Abul Fazl and Firishta; but, as the former seems somewhat uncertain of his facts, the account of the latter may perhaps be more advantageously followed.

General Briggs' version of Firishta records, quite briefly, that Mirza Haidar had appointed one Kirán Bahádur, a commander of Moghul horse, to the government of the district of Bhirbal.* The measure gave great offence to the inhabitants, who resisted Kirán's authority, and eventually proceeded to attack him. Mirza Haidar, in order to support his officer, put himself at the head of his Moghuls, and marched towards the scene of the disturbance. On the road, a night attack was made upon his camp, the Moghuls were defeated, and he himself was killed by an arrow in the course of the fight. The exact date of the event in 1551 is nowhere recorded, but it would appear to have taken place on one of the last days of Rámzán, or about the beginning of October.* In Mr. Rodgers' version, the circum­stances are related in much greater detail, but some of the particulars are not quite intelligible. The substance, however, is the same, and the account makes it appear that the locality where Mirza Haidar fell, must have been somewhere near Báramula on the Jhilam. It points also to his death having been caused through being accidentally struck by an arrow, discharged by one of his own men, in the darkness.

During the ten years (counting from the battle of 2nd August, 1541) over which Mirza Haidar's regency extended, he is said, in the Akbar-Náma, to have devoted himself, when not actively engaged with his enemies, to the restoration of the province and the improvement of its resources. He found it in a state of ruin and desolation, and raised it to a land abounding in culti­vation and flourishing towns; he extended the frontiers also, and ruled with moderation and justice. Yet the austere Abul Fazl takes him to task for devoting too much of his time and attention to music, and thereby becoming forgetful of the dangers that surrounded him. Still more he blames him for continuing the government of the State in the name of the puppet Prince, Názuk Shah. After his military successes, it was his duty, the historian considers, to read the prayers and strike the coins in the name of “his imperial benefactor then struggling with adversity;” while there was no necessity to cultivate the attachment of the native rulers. Yet he is obliged to admit that when Humayun had returned from exile in Persia, and had repossessed himself of Kabul, Mirza Haidar at once conceded to him the honours due to a sovereign.

How far Abul Fazl's estimate of Mirza Haidar's character is a just one, may be open to question. In the first place, it was not entirely to music that he devoted the interval of well-earned repose that he enjoyed in Kashmir. It was during these years that he wrote the Tarikh-i-Rashidi—a work which, strange to say, Abul Fazl makes no mention of. Yet it is evident, from incidental allusions to dates in the body of the book, that this task occupied no little of the Mirza's time. To judge by the number of authors he cites, or speaks of, in the course of his history, he must have collected a good number of books about him, and the study of these may perhaps have occupied more of his leisure than the lute or the zitára. Among them, it may be noted, was a copy of the “Memoirs” of his cousin Baber, which, in all probability, he had obtained while in India at the court either of Humayun or of Kámrán; and, no doubt, it was the first copy ever utilised for historical purposes. Secondly, as regards the imputed infidelity towards the Chaghatai Em­peror, it should not be forgotten that the historian of Akbar was writing after events had seemed to justify his view. At the time when Mirza Haidar administered Kashmir in the name of Názuk Shah, Humayun was a refugee in Persia, dependent on the uncertain friendship of Shah Tahmásp, and it must have been quite a matter for speculation whether he would ever return, or if, indeed, any member of the house of Baber would again occupy the throne of Hindustan. After completely subjugating Kashmir, and defeating the troops that Shir Shah had sent against him, there seems to have been no reason, but loyalty to the Chaghatais, why the Mirza should not have set himself up as king of the State.

His action in recognising the native puppet may fairly be regarded as one of self-denial—a temporary measure, under­taken while waiting to see whether his patron might not return, and claim his own kingdom in India. As events fell out, he did return, though not till January 1555, or nearly four years after our author's death. Step by step, he made himself master of the principal districts of Afghanistan, regained Kunduz and Badakhshán, and disposed of Kámrán Mirza, together with other enemies of his house. But as early as 1545, when, with the aid of Shah Tahmásp, he had wrested only Kandahar and Kabul from his rebellious brother, and while still far beyond the limits of India, Mirza Haidar transferred to Humayun the nominal sovereignty with which he had invested Názuk Shah. He sent an envoy to Kabul, to inform his patron of these pro­ceedings and to invite him to Kashmir. His letters were full of expressions of loyalty and attachment, and, in pressing his invitation, he pointed out that the country he had subdued would serve as an impregnable position, from which the Emperor might pour down his troops for the conquest of Hindustan— an enterprise which he urged him to attempt without delay.* He is recorded, moreover, by Abul Fazl himself, to have read the prayers and to have struck the coins in Humayun's name at about this period; while unanswerable evidence as regards the coinage is to be found, to this day, among the specimens of the money of Kashmir, which have come down to us. In the British Museum there is a silver coin of Kashmir, bearing the name of Humayun and dated 952 or 953* of the Hajra (1545 or 1546). Mr. Rodgers also describes two coins of Humayun which were struck, in Kashmir, in the year 953, and another bearing a date subsequent to 950, but on which the third figure is illegible. This last one, however, contains in the field a letter ha, which Mr. Rodgers believes may stand for the initial letter of the name Haidar. In any case, the dates that are decipherable not only fall within the period of Mirza Haidar's regency, but they are good evidence that he regarded Humayun as his sovereign, while at the height of his own power in Kashmir, although no coins are known which show that he so regarded him previous to his recovery of Kabul.* Neither the coins nor the docu­mentary history of the period, however, are completely worked out, and until the tales that both have to tell are exhausted, it would perhaps be premature to conclude that, even prior to the subjugation of Afghanistan in 1545, Mirza Haidar may not have afforded testimony, in one form or another, that he regarded him­self and his puppet king as, alike, dependants of the Chaghatai Emperor.

Thus, whatever faults the Mirza may have had, disloyalty to his chiefs can hardly be accounted one of them. He served his first master, Sultan Said Khan, with devotion till the end of the Khan's reign, and when forced by the barbarities of his successor, Rashid Sultan, to seek safety for his life with the Chaghatais in India, he served them likewise with good faith, as long as he lived.

Besides Abul Fazl's and Firishta's, the notices of Mirza Haidar's life, among the writings of Asiatic authors, appear to be few. Several quote his history, and even copy from it extensively, but only two, as far as I have been able to ascer­tain from translations, make any mention of his personality. Jauhar, in his Memoirs of Humayun,* does no more than briefly allude to his master's faithful lieutenant. The author of the Tarikh-i-Daudi, cited above, calls him “a youth of a magna­nimous disposition,” but vouchsafes no more.* Amin Ahmad Rázi, however, has devoted a few sentences to him in his geographical work, the Haft Iklim, an important extract from which was translated into French by Quatremère, and pub­lished in 1843.* Ahmad Rázi tells us that Mirza Haidar “was endowed with an excellent character and a rare talent for elegant composition in verse, as well as in prose. To these gifts of nature, he added those of extreme valour, and all the qualities that constitute a great general. Having been sent into Kashmir by Sultan Abu Said Khan,* he penetrated into this province by the road of Kashghar and Tibet [Ladak] and entirely subdued it. He entered it also a second time from the side of India, and establishing his residence in Kashmir, formed it into an independent principality … He was author of the historical work entitled the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, which was named in this way after Rashid Khan, sovereign of Kashghar. This book enjoys universal esteem.” Ahmad Rázi then appends some verses of the Mirza's, as a specimen of his poetic genius.

Among Europeans, Mr. W. Erskine is perhaps the only original author who has touched on Mirza Haidar's personal characteristics or attainments; even he does so only very briefly, though in several passages he praises his work in the highest terms. He sums him up as “a man of worth, of talent, and of learning.”* For his own part, he naively tells us that he had many accomplishments, and though most of those he names were of a more or less mechanical order, others, at least, show a taste for authorship, and make us picture him as a man of some imagination. Taking into consideration the life he led—his adventures, sufferings, discomfitures, and escapes— and the age and countries he lived in, he may be accounted also a man of learning. At any rate, he was a patron of the learned whom he came in contact with, and seems to have taken an interest in their teachings, as well as in the books he knew of; though it may be open to question, perhaps (from a European point of view), how far he used them to the best advantage for historical purposes. Yet, withal, he was a bigoted Musulman and a fanatical Sunni, as his remarks about the transactions of Baber with the Persian Shias, after the capture of Samarkand in 1511, clearly indicate. And his bigotry took many curious forms, as, for instance, his approval of the hypocritical proceedings of Sultan Said Khan, his refraining to trace his pedigree beyond the date of Amir Bulaji, because Bulaji's ancestors were not Musulmans, and his pious invocations on the Moghul Khan, whose religious zeal and enlightenment led him to drive horseshoe nails into the heads of his subjects, to induce them to become Musulmans. In short he belonged to his times, and herein lies the chief value of all that he has left on record.

The reader, however, will form his own judgment of the author's character and worth. What may safely be said is that his history carries with it a conviction of honesty; while he himself, though a soldier of fortune, was, as shown by the advice he tendered to Humayun, and by his administration of Kashmir, no mere Dugald Dalgetty of the East.