As the Shāhinshāh's world-adorning mind was always directed towards the management of Kabul and was inquisitive about the affairs thereof, he now heard that Faẓīl* Beg, the brother of Mun'im Khān, had joined with Amīr Bābūs, Shāh Walī Atka, 'Ali Muḥammad Asp, Sēonj Sīdhī Māhī, Khwājah Khāṣ Malik and a number of others in reporting to the cupola of chastity, Māh Cūcak Begam the mother of Muḥammad Ḥakīm, the immoderate conduct of Ghanī Khān, and had used all their endeavours to remove him from Kabul, the abode of pleasure. He therefore appointed Mun'im Khān to be the guard­ian of M. Muḥammad Ḥakīm and sent him to Kābul. The details of this are as follows: Though Faẓīl Beg's eyes were deprived of sight, yet in chicanery and strife-mongering his whole body was an eye. He was always disturbed and dissatisfied about his nephew's rule, and in truth Ghanī Khān, Mun'im Khān's son, was without dis­cretion or good sense. In addition to this, the intoxication of authority had cast him down from the pillar of moderation. Evil com­panionship, the worst ill of humanity, was dragging him down, with the lasso of ruin, from the height of auspiciousness to the depth of misery. At last that faction made the noble lady, the Begam, one of their party. In the beginning of Shahriyūr, Divine month, of the seventh year, Ghanī Khān had gone towards Zama,* to visit the melon-fields. They strengthened the city and shut the gate of the citadel against him. He equipped a force and came over against the Delhi gate and halted on the ridge of the Sīāẖ Sang. But he could not effect his object. He sent Pahlwān 'Idī Kotwāl on an embassy, thinking that perhaps he might by craft and stratagem effect something. The persons above named replied that Ghani Khān had not been appointed to the government by H.M. the Shāhinshāh, and that the people had been brought into straits by his tyranny and immoderation. The proper thing now for him was to go off in safety. If he wanted to have again the government of this country he should go to Court and have his conduct tested, and should bring an order from the Diwān of the Caliphate, so that it might be acted upon. During these parleys his men took to deserting him. When he had halted there a long time and had perceived that he would not be able to enter the city and that he was nearly being captured, he, by the advice of Hamza 'Arab and Mīr Maghīu-d-dīn of Nīshāpūr, went towards Jalālabād. All his property in the city was plundered. The cause of the courage of the Kabulīs in this matter was the affair of Tūlak Khān Qūcīn.

The brief account of this is that Ghanī Khān, in whom youthful presumption and intoxication were added to innate wickedness, thought that his advantage consisted in others' loss. He behaved with quarrelsomeness and levity and did not pay respect to men's position. His manners were bad, and insolent. One of his actions was the arresting without cause Tūlak Khān Qūcīn, who was famous for his valour and an intimate courtier of H.M. Jahānbāni Jinnat Āshiyānī. He put him and a number of his relatives into confine­ment.

Not everyone who does evil does you evil
Certes he does that evil to himself.

At length some prudent persons interposed and released him. After this affront Tūlaq Khān went to the village of Māmā Khātūn which was his fief. There he wrapped the foot of courage in the skirt of patience and sought for an opportunity of revenge. Mean­while a caravan was coming from Balkh. Ghanī Khān heard of its arrival at Cārīkārān and went out with a few men to meet it and to make a choice of the goods, giving out that he was going to visit Khwāja Sihyārān, which is an enchanting spot. There he inaugu. rated a drunken feast and played the melody of self-indulgence. When Tūlak Khān, who was, in season and out of season, meditating revenge, heard of his expedition, he recognised the advantage of the opportunity and hurried after him with a number of his kinsfolk and servants. At midnight he came upon Ghanī Khān, who had given away his sense to wine and his body to slumber, and caught his prey. He arrested him and Shagūn the son of Qarāca Khān and put them into confinement. He also emptied his wrathful heart by reproaches. Thinking that as he had the governor as his prisoner he might also seize the city, he turned back from there, and having won over the militia of Kabul he halted at Khwājah Rivāsh which is within two kos of Kabul. Faẓīl Beg and Abu-l-fatḥ, his son, and Ghanī Khān's men prepared for war. Tūlak Khān perceived that his enterprise would not succeed, and that he would not get hold of the city. He contented himself with a portion of his object and proposed peace and a division of territory. Faẓīl Beg considered this proposal advantageous on account of his wish to release his brother's son, and sent the chief man of the city to Tūlak. He made over to him the territory from M'amūra-i-pai-Minar to the limits of Ẓuḥāk and Bāmīān, which was about a fifth of Kabul. In this way he extinguished the flames of disturbance and rescued Ghanī Khān from his clutches.

O Sage,* consider the work of fate
You will at last get the result of your actions
Your safety consists in not injuring anyone
There is a brisk market of recompense for well-doing.

Ghanī Khān did not make Kabul an abode of kindness but left the register of the treaty and agreements in the niche of forgetful­ness. He proceeded against Tūlak with all his forces. Tūlak did not see it advisable to remain in Kabul and went off with his rela­tions and men to the world-protecting court, and took the high road to India. Ghanī Khān followed him with a large force. As Tūlak Khān had not power to resist he took to flight. Near the village of Zhāla, which is a ford of the Ghorband* river, the Kabul army came up with him, and a battle ensued. At last Tūlak Khān with his son Isfandiyār and a few of his kinsmen and servants manfully made their way through so large a force. Bābāi Qūcīn, Maskīn Qūcīn and others of his servants were killed. Ghanī Khān returned from there successful and came to Kabul. There he spread out the carpet of tyr­rany and self-glorification, and lengthened the arm of oppression over the citizens. And though he knew the disorganised state of M. Muḥammad Ḥakīm's affairs he paid no attention to them. The Mīr-zā's men and the rest of the people of Kābul were distressed by this, and joined with Faẓīl Beg and his son Abu-l-fatḥ to suppress him. By chance at this time the melon-fields of the village of Mamūra were in perfection, and a desire to visit the melon-fields took posses­sion of him. He forgot what has been said—

As the time of his downfall had arrived, he went off to visit the melon-fields and stayed the night there. Abu-l-fatḥ Beg and other known men of the city took the opportunity and brought in M. Muḥammad Ḥakīm over the Iron Gate, and beat drums, and blew trumpets. A great uproar arose of high and low. Ghanī Khān on getting the news came in a confused state and with the few men who were with him towards the city. When he arrived there he saw that the chess-board had been arranged after a new fashion and that the gates of concord were closed, while those of hostility were open, and that he could not advance. Should he come nearer it was probable that his companions, who had their families in the city, would leave him alone, or rather would seize him and take him along with them. In an astonished and distracted state of mind he pitched his tent on the side of the Sīāh Sang and halted there. The garri­son fired guns at him, and as fate would have it a ball struck the tent. When Ghanī Khān saw this he got terrified and went* off to India with a hundred brands of disgrace and with the uprooting of thousands of longings for his home and family and the government of Kābul. After Ghanī Khān had departed, the cupola of chastity, the noble lady Māh Cūcak Begam, undertook the affairs of Kābul and appointed Faẓīl Beg as the Vakīl of M. Muḥammad Ḥakīm. As he was blind, his son Abu-l-fatḥ managed affairs as his father's Naib, and as the latter had neither magnanimity nor far-reaching rea­son he did not attend to justice in distributing the fiefs, and the dis­posal of business, and conducted himself foolishly. The worst of all was that he took the select fiefs for himself and his friends, and alloted inferior ones for the Mīrzā's household, and practised extraordinary oppressions on his own account. Among these things was his giving Ghaznīn to M. Khiẓr Khān who was one of the chiefs of the Hazāras, and his arresting Bābūs Beg and making him over to his charge. He also took all the other property of Bābūs and squandered it. Whoever does not possess sound reason, by the light of which he can direct his actions, nor a seeing eye whereby he may be warned by observing the conduct of others, nor right-thinking companionship, whose words he may follow, will assuredly receive in this world of retribution due punishment. Accordingly, when two months of this state of affairs had passed, the Mīrzā's honoured mother and the old servants could not endure the oppression and bound up the loins of revolt. A number of them, such as Walī Atka, 'Alī Muḥammad Asp, Mīram, a relation of Shāh Walī, M'aṣūm Kabulī, Sīyūndūk, 'Īdī Sarmast and many others conspired against Faẓīl Beg's son, and waited for an opportunity. One night they called him out of his house for this purpose and had a drinking party in a tent which they had erected in the courtyard of the Cahal Sitūn (forty pillars) Diwān-khāna. The cups circulated, and the drinking of bumpers went on from evening till night. Meanwhile Abū-l-fatḥ several times prepared to leave. The members of the party prevented him by drunken flatteries from going out. This* doomed drunk­ard was unaware that it was the last day of his fortune. When time had come to the end of night and sleep had overpowered him, the party which had conspired to shed his blood drew their swords and entered the tent. They slew him and Mīram Bahādur a relative of Shāh Walī, cut off his head and placed it on a spear. His body was flung down from the citadel, and there was a great uproar in Kābul. When Faẕīl Beg heard of the fate of Abu-l-fatḥ he was dismayed, and having with the aid of Muḥammad Sanjār, the son of Khiẓr Khān Hazāra, and whose son Sikandar was Faẓīl's son-in-law, collected his goods, he wished to go to the encampments of the Hazāras. He set out with this intention, but some of the Mīrzā's servants hearing of it went after him. They caught him and brought him to the fort and put him to death. After that Shāh Walī Atka became the general manager of Kabul. In his folly he took to him­self the title of 'Aādil Shāh and gave Ḥaidar Qāsim Kohbar the post of Khān-Khānān, and to Khwājah Khāṣ Malik, the eunuch, the title of Ikhlāṣ Khān. In his presumption and folly he assigned titles which kings give to their friends. By his own efforts he arranged for his destruction. In a short time the Begam suspected him of aiming at rebellion and sent him to the abode of annihilation. She assumed the management of the affairs of Kabul and for considerations of propriety chose as the Mīrzā's Vakīl, Ḥaidar Qāsim Kohbar, whose ancestors had been officers under H.M. Getī Sitānī Firdūs Makānī, and H.M. Jahānbānī Jinnat Āshiyānī. We have made a long digres­sion for the purpose of animating our discourse.