Sheibāni Khan having passed the Murghāb in the month
of Muharrem,*
the first notice they had of his approach was
the news of his arrival in the vicinity of Sarkāi.*
Being
filled with consternation, they were unable to do any one
thing that was requisite. They could neither assemble their
men, nor draw up their army in battle array; every man
Death of
Zūlnūn
Beg.
went off to shift for himself. Zūlnūn Arghūn, infatuated
by absurd flattery, as has been mentioned, kept his ground
at Kara Rabāt against fifty thousand Uzbeks, with a
hundred or a hundred and fifty men. A great body of the
enemy coming up, took him in an instant, and swept on.*
They cut off his head as soon as he was taken.
The mother, sister,* haram,* and treasures of the Mirzas were in the castle of Ikhtiyār-ed-dīn, which commonly goes by the name of Aleh Kūrghān.* The Mirzas reached the city late in the evening: they slept till midnight to refresh their horses. At dawn they abandoned the place, without even having thought of putting the fort in a state of defence. During this interval of leisure, they took no means for carrying off their mother, sister, wives, or children, but ran away, leaving them prisoners in the hands of the Uzbeks.* Payandeh Sultan Begum, Khadījeh Begum, with the wives and women of Sultan Hussain Mirza, of Badīa-ez-zemān Mirza, and Muzaffer Mirza, their children, infants, and whatever treasure and effects the Mirzas possessed, were all in Aleh Kūrghān. They had not put the fort in a sufficient posture of defence, and the troops that had been appointed to garrison it had not arrived. Āshik Muhammed Arghūn, the younger brother of Mazīd Beg, having fled on foot from the army, arrived at Heri and entered the castle. Ali Khān, the son of Amīr Umer Beg, Sheikh Abdallah Bekāwal, Mirza Beg Kai-Khosravi, and Mīraki Kūr Diwān, also threw themselves into the castle. On Sheibāni Khan’s arrival, after two or three days, the Sheikh-ūl-Islam and the chief men of the city, having made a capitulation, took the keys of the walled town, went out to meet him and surrendered the place. Āshik Muhammed, however, held out the castle for sixteen or seventeen days longer; but a mine being run from without, near the horse-market, and fired, a tower was demolished. On this the people in the castle, thinking that all was over with them, gave up all thoughts of holding out, and surrendered.
Sheibāni’sAfter the taking of Heri, Sheibāni Khan behaved extremely ill to the children and wives of the kings; nor to them alone, he conducted himself towards everybody in a rude, unseemly, and unworthy manner, forfeiting his good name and glory for a little wretched earthly pelf. The first of Sheibāni Khan’s misdeeds in Heri was, that for the sake of some worldly dirt, he ordered Khadījeh Begum to be given up to Shah Mansūr Bakhshi, the catamite, to be plundered and treated as one of his meanest female slaves.* Again, he gave the reverend and respected saint, Sheikh Purān, to the Moghul Abdul Wahāb to be plundered; each of his sons he gave to a different person for the same purpose. He gave the poets and authors to Mulla Banāi to be squeezed. Among the jeux d´esprit on this subject, one tetrastich is often repeated in Khorasān:
Except only Abdallah Kīrkhar,* to-day,
There is not a poet can show the colour of money;
Banāi is inflamed with hopes of getting hold of the poet’s cash,
But he will only get hold of a kīrkhar.*
There was a Khan’s daughter called Khanum, one of Muzaffer Mirza’s haram.* Sheibāni Khan married her immediately on taking Heri, without being restrained by her being in an impure state.* In spite of his supreme ignorance, he had the vanity to deliver lectures in explanation of the Koran to Kazi Ikhtiyār and Muhammed Mīr Yūsef, who were among the most celebrated Mullas in Khorasān and Heri. He also took a pen and corrected the writing and drawings of Mulla Sultan Ali, and Behzād the painter. When at any time he happened to have composed one of his dull couplets, he read it from the pulpit, hung it up in the Chārsū (or Public Market), and levied a benevolence from the townspeople on the joyful occasion. He did know something of reading the Koran,* but he was guilty of a number of stupid, absurd, presumptuous, infidel words and deeds, such as I have mentioned.
Death ofTen or fifteen days after the taking of Heri, he advanced from Kahdastān to the bridge of Sālār, and sent his whole army, under the command of Taimūr Sultan and Abīd Sultan, against Abul Hassan Mirza and Kūpek Mirza, who were lying in Meshhad,* quite off their guard. At one time they thought of defending Kalāt*; at another time, on hearing of the approach of this army, they had thoughts of giving it the slip, and of pushing on by forced marches by another road, and so falling on Sheibāni Khan by surprise. This was a wonderfully good idea; they could not, however, come to any resolution, and were still lying in their old quarters, when Taimūr Sultan and Abīd Sultan came in sight with their army, after a series of rapid marches. The Mirzas, on their side, put their army in array, and marched out. Abul Hassan Mirza was speedily routed. Kūpek Mirza, with a few men, fell on the enemy who had engaged his brother. They routed him also. Both of them were made prisoners. When the two brothers met they embraced, kissed each other, and took a last farewell. Abul Hassan Mirza showed some dejection,* but no difference could be marked in Kūpek Mirza. The heads of the two Mirzas were sent to Sheibāni Khan while he was at the Bridge of Sālār.
BāburAt this time Shah Beg, and his younger brother Muhammed Mukīm,* being alarmed at the progress of Sheibāni Khan, sent me several ambassadors in succession, with submissive letters, to convey professions of their attachment and fidelity. Mukīm himself, in a letter to me, explicitly called upon me to come to his succour. At a season like this, when the Uzbeks had entirely occupied the country, it did not appear to me becoming to remain idly looking on; and, after so many ambassadors and letters had been sent to invite me, I did not think it necessary to stand on the ceremony of waiting till these noblemen came* personally to pay me their compliments. Having consulted with all my Amirs and best-informed counsellors, it was arranged that we should march to their assistance with our army; and that, after forming a junction with the Arghūn Amirs, we might consult together, and either march against Khorasān, or follow some other course that might appear more expedient. With these intentions, we set out for Kandahār. At Ghazni I met Habībeh Sultan Begum, whom, as has been mentioned, I called my Yanka,* and who had brought her daughter Maasūmeh Sultan Begum, as had been settled between us at Heri. Khosrou Gokultāsh, Sultan Kuli Chanāk, and Gadai Balāl had fled from Heri to Ibn Hussain Mirza, and had afterwards left him also, and gone to Abul Hassan Mirza. Finding it equally impossible to remain with him, they came for the purpose of joining me, and accompanied the ladies.
PassesWhen we reached Kalāt,* the merchants of Hindustān, who had come to Kalāt to traffic, had not time to escape, as our soldiers came upon them quite unexpectedly. The general opinion was, that, at a period of confusion like the present, it was fair to plunder all such as came from a foreign country. I would not acquiesce in this. I asked, ‘What offence have these merchants committed? If, for the love of God, we suffer these trifling things to escape, God will one day give us great and important benefits in return; as happened to us not very long ago, when we were on our expedition against the Ghiljis; the Mahmands, with their flocks, their whole effects, wives, and families, were within a single farsang of the army. Many urged us to fall upon them. From the same considerations that influence me now, I combated that proposal, and the very next morning Almighty God, from the property of the refractory Afghans, the Ghiljis, bestowed on the army so much spoil as had never perhaps been taken in any other inroad.’ We encamped after passing Kalāt, and merely levied something from each merchant by way of peshkesh.*
Is met by