Another is keūreh,* which has a very sweet smell. The Arabs call it kāri.* The fault of musk is, that it is rather drying.* This may be called the moist musk. It has a singular appearance. Its flower may be about a span and a half or two spans in length. It has long leaves like the gherau.* This flower, too, is prickly, like the rose-bud, when unblown; its outer leaves are very green and prickly, while its inner leaves are white and soft. Among its inner leaves is something like a centre or heart.* It* has a sweet smell. It resembles a new-blown shrub, the trunk of which is not yet grown up, but its leaves are broader and more prickly. Its trunk is very ill proportioned. It springs in stalks from the ground.*
Chambeli,Another is the white jasmine, which they call chambeli.* It is larger than our jasmine, and its perfume stronger.
Seasons.In other countries there are four seasons; in Hindustān there are three; four months of summer, four of the rainy season, and four of winter. Its months begin with the new moon. Every three years they add a month to the rainy season; again, at the end of the next three years they add a single month to one of their winters; and in the course of the succeeding three years they add one month to a summer. This is their mode of intercalation. Cheit,* Beisākh, Jeth, and Asārh* are the summer months, corresponding to Pisces, Aries, Taurus, and Gemini; Sāwan, Bhādun, Kuwār, and Kātik form the rainy months, corresponding to Cancer, Leo, Virgo, and Libra; Aghen, Pūs, Māgh, and Phāgun are the winter, and include Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricornus, and Aquarius. The natives of Hindustān, who have divided their seasons into terms of four months each, have confined the appellation of the violence of the season to two months of each term, and call them the period of summer, the period of the rains, the period of winter. The two last months of summer, which are Jeth and Asārh, they separate from the others, calling them the period of the heats. The two first months of the rainy season, Sāwan and Bhādun, they regard as the period of the rains; the two middle months of winter, which are Pūs and Māgh, they consider as the period of winter. By this arrangement they have six seasons.*
Days of theThey also assign names to the days of the week: Sanīcher is Saturday; Aitwār is Sunday; Somwār, Monday; Mangelwār, Tuesday; Budhwār, Wednesday; Brispatwār, Thursday; and Shukrwār, Friday.
Day and As, by the usage of our country, the day and night are
divided into twenty-four parts, each called an hour, and
each hour into sixty minutes; so that the day and night are
composed of one thousand four hundred and forty minutes;
and as in the space of a minute, the fātiheh (or first chapter
of the Korān), with the bismillah (or blessing), may be
repeated six times, they may be repeated eight thousand six
hundred and forty times in the space of a night and day.
The natives of Hindustān divide the night and day into
sixty parts, each of which they denominate a ghari; they
likewise divide the night into four parts, and the day into
the same number, each of which they call a pahar (or watch),
which the Persians call a pās. In our country I had heard
of pās and pāsbān,*
though I did not understand the custom.*
In all the principal cities of Hindustān, there is a sort of
people called ghariāli, who are appointed and stationed for
this express purpose. They cast a broad brass plate about
the size of a tray, and two fingers-breadth deep. This brass
vessel they call ghariāl.*
The ghariāl is suspended from a
Their clep-
sydra.
high place. They have another vessel like an hour-cup,
which has a hole in its bottom. One of these is filled every
hour*;
and the ghariālis, who watch by turns, attend to
the cup that is*
put into the water. In this way, beginning
from daybreak, when they put in the cup, as soon as it is
Mode of
marking
time.
filled for the first time, they strike one stroke on the ghariāl
with a wooden club which they have; and when it has been
filled a second time, they strike two, and so on for the first
watch. The signal that the first watch*
is past, is their
striking very fast for a number of times on the ghariāl with
the wooden club. If it is the first watch of the day, after
striking repeatedly and fast, they stop a little, and strike
one blow; if it be the second watch, after striking fast for
some time, they deliberately strike two; and after the
third they strike three, and after the fourth four. With
the fourth watch the day closing, the night watch begins;
and they go through the night watches in precisely the same
Alteration
introduced
by Bābur.
way. Formerly the ghariālis, whether by day or night,
beat the sign of the watch at the end of each watch only;
so that when a man waked from sleep, and heard the sound
of three or four gharis, he did not know whether it was the
second watch or the third. I directed, that after beating
the sign of the ghari, whether by night or day,*
they should
likewise beat the sign of the watch. For example, that after
beating three gharis of the first watch,*
they should stop,
and after an interval, beat one other blow as the mark of the
watch, so that it might be known that it was three gharis of
the first watch. After beating four gharis of the third watch
of the night, if they stopped and beat three, it would indicate
that it was four gharis of the third watch. This answers
particularly well; for when a man wakes by night and hears
the ghariāl, he knows with certainty how many gharis of a
Division
of time.
particular watch are past. Again, they divide every ghari
into sixty parts, each called a pal; so that every day and
night consists of three thousand six hundred pals. They
reckon each pal equal to the time in which the eyelids may
be shut and opened sixty times; and reckon a day and night
equal to two hundred and sixteen thousand times of shutting
and opening the eyes. By experiment, I found that one
pal admitted of the kulhowullah and bismillah*
being
repeated nearly eight times, so that, in the space of a single
night and day, they admit of being repeated twenty-eight
thousand six hundred*
times.
The inhabitants of Hindustān have a peculiar* method of reckoning as to measures; they allow eight ratis to one māsheh; four māshehs to one tāng,* or thirty-two ratis to one tāng; five māshehs to one mishkāl, which is equal to forty ratis; twelve māshehs make one tola or ninety-six ratis; fourteen tolas make one ser; and it is fixed that everywhere forty sers make one man, and twelve mans one māni,* and one hundred mānis one mināseh. They reckon jewels* and precious stones by the tāng.
Mode ofThe natives of Hindustān have a distinct and clear* mode of reckoning. They call a hundred thousand a lak, a hundred laks a kror, a hundred krors an arb, a hundred arbs a kerb, a hundred kerbs a nīl, a hundred nīls a padam, a hundred padams a sang. The fixing such a high mode of calculation is a proof of the abundance of wealth in Hindustān.
Hindu in-Most of the natives of Hindustān are pagans. They call the pagan inhabitants of Hindustān, Hindus. Most of the Hindus hold the doctrine of transmigration. The officers of revenue, merchants* and work-people, are all Hindus. In our native country, the tribes that inhabit the plains and deserts have all names, according to their respective families; but here everybody, whether they live in the country or in villages, have names according to their families.* Again, every tradesman* has received his trade from his forefathers,* who for generations have all practised the same trade.
Defects of