Instantly on receiving this intelligence, we increased our speed, and sent on a skirmishing party before us, which overtook and killed several Afghans, whose heads they cut off, and brought back to the main body, along with a number of prisoners, bullocks, and sheep. The Dilazāk Afghans also cut off and brought in several heads. Returning from thence, we halted in the neighbourhood of Kātlang,* where I sent guides in search of Khwājeh Mīr Mirān, who had been sent on with the baggage, with instructions to bring him to join me in Makām.
February Next morning we marched, and passing by way of
Kātlang, halted in the midst of Makām.* *
One of Shah
Mansūr’s people here joined us, and I dispatched Khosrou
Gokultāsh and Ahmedi Perwānchi with a body of troops
February
15.
to meet and protect the baggage. On Tuesday the 14th, just
as we halted in Makām, the baggage joined us. In the course
of the last thirty or forty years, one Shahbāz Kalender,
an impious unbeliever, had perverted the faith of numbers
of the Yūsefzais and Dilazāks. At the abrupt termination
of the hill of Makām, there is a small hillock that overlooks
all the plain country. It is extremely beautiful, commanding
a prospect as far as the eye can reach, and is conspicuous
from the lower grounds.*
Upon it stood the tomb of
Shahbāz Kalender. I visited it, and surveyed the whole
place. It struck me as improper that so charming and
delightful a spot should be occupied by the tomb of an
unbeliever. I therefore gave orders that the tomb should
be pulled down, and levelled with the ground. As the
situation was fine, both for climate and beauty, I took a
maajūn,*
and continued there for some time.
When we left Bajour, we did it with the intention of attacking Behreh* before we returned to Kābul. We were always full of the idea of invading Hindustān.* This was prevented by various circumstances. For three or four months that the army had been detained in Bajour, it had got no plunder of value. As Behreh is on the borders of Hindustān, and was near at hand, I conceived that, if I were now to push on without baggage, the soldiers might light upon some booty. Moving on under these impressions, and plundering the Afghans in our progress, when I reached Makām, several of my principal adherents advised me, that if we were to enter Hindustān, we should do it on a proper footing, and with an adequate force; that a great part of our army had been left behind at Kābul; that a body of our best troops had been left at Bajour; that a number, too, in consequence of the weakness of their horses, had returned to Lamghān; that the horses even of those who still continued with us, were so wretched, that they were unfit for a single day’s hard service. Though the advice was perfectly judicious, we made the inroad in spite of all these objections.
FebruaryEarly next morning we marched towards the passage over the Sind. I dispatched Mīr Muhammed jālehbān* in advance, with his brothers and some troops to escort them, for the purpose of examining the banks of the river, both above and below. After sending on the army towards the river, I myself set off for Sawāti,* which they likewise call Karak-khāneh,* to hunt the rhinoceros. We started many rhinoceroses,* but, as the country abounded in brushwood, we could not get at them. A she rhinoceros that had whelps,* came out and fled along the plain; many arrows were shot at her, but as the wooded ground was near at hand she gained cover. We set fire to the brushwood, but the rhinoceros was not to be found. We got sight of another,* that, having been scorched in the fire, was lamed and unable to run.* We killed it, and every one cut off a bit of it as a trophy of the chase. Leaving Sawāti, after a wide and fatiguing circuit,* we reached the camp about bed-time prayers. The party that had been sent to survey the passage over the river did so, and returned.
Bābur Next morning, being Thursday the 17th,*
we crossed
the ford*
with our horses, camels, and baggage; the camp
bazar and the infantry were floated across on rafts. The
same day*
the inhabitants of Nilāb*
waited on me, bringing
an armed horse and three hundred shahrokhis,*
as a peshkesh.
As soon as we had got all our people across, that same day
at noon-day prayers, we proceeded on our march, which
we continued for one watch of the night, and halted at the
February
18.
river of Kacheh-kot. Marching thence before day, we
crossed the river of Kacheh-kot, and the same evening*
surmounted the Pass of Sangdaki,*
and halted. Syed Kāsim
Ishek-Agha, who brought up the rear guard, took a few
Gujers who followed the camp, cut off some of their heads
and brought them in.
Marching at the dawn from Sangdaki, and crossing the river Suhān* about noon-day prayers, we encamped. Our stragglers continued to come in till midnight. It was an uncommonly long and severe march, and as it was made when our horses were lean and weak, it was peculiarly hard on them, so that many horses were worn out, and fell down by the way. Seven kos from Behreh to the north, there is a hill. This hill, in the Zafer-nāmeh* and some other books, is called the hill of Jūd.* At first I was ignorant of the origin of its name, but afterwards discovered that in this hill there were two races of men descended of the same father. One tribe is called Jūd, the other Janjūheh.* From old times, they have been the rulers and lords of the inhabitants of this hill, and of the Īls and Ulūses which are between Nilāb and Behreh; but their power is exerted in a friendly and brotherly way. They cannot take from them whatever they please. They take as their share a portion that has been fixed from very remote times. The one never takes, and the others never give, a single grain more or less. Their agreement is as follows: They give a shahrokhi* for each head of cattle; seven shahrokhis are paid by each master of a family, and they serve in their armies. The Jūd are divided into various branches or families, as well as the Janjūheh. This hill, which lies within seven kos of Behreh, branching off from the hill-country of Kashmīr, which belongs to the same range as Hindū-kūsh, takes a south-westerly direction, and terminates below Dīnkot,* on the river Sind.* On the one half of this hill are the Jūd, and on the other the Janjūheh. This hill got the name of Jūd from a supposed resemblance to the celebrated hill of Jūd.* * The chief man among them gets the name of Rai. His younger brothers and sons are called Malik.* These Janjūheh were the maternal uncles of Langer Khan. The name of the Hākim of the Īls and Ulūses in the neighbourhood of the river Suhān was Malik Hast. His original name was Asad, but as the people of Hindustān often drop the vowels, calling, for instance, khabar, khabr, and asad, asd, this word, going on from one corruption to another, ended in becoming Hast.
Immediately on reaching our ground I sent Langer Khan in order to bring in Malik Hast. He galloped off, and by impressing him with a persuasion of my generosity and favourable intentions in his behalf, returned, accompanied by him, about bed-time prayers. Malik Hast brought a caparisoned horse with him by way of peshkesh, and made his submission. He was about the twenty-second or twenty-third year of his age.*
Many flocks of sheep, and herds of brood-mares, were feeding on all sides of the camp. As I always had the conquest of Hindustān at heart, and as the countries of Behreh, Khushāb, Chenāb, and Chiniot,* among which I now was, had long been in the possession of the Tūrks, I regarded them as my own domains, and was resolved to acquire the possession of them either by war or peace. It was, therefore, right and necessary that the people of the hill should be well treated. I accordingly issued orders that no one should molest or trouble their flocks or herds, or take from them to the value of a bit of thread or a broken needle.