The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)
of the parting; others may be meant on _guzīd_ and _gazīd_, on
_sazīd_ and _chāra_. The verse would provide the holiday
amusement of extracting from it two justifiable translations.
[1373] His possessions extended from the river of Sawād to
Bāramūla; he was expelled from them by the Yūsuf-zāī
(Erskine).
[1374] This will be the naze of the n.e. rampart of the Bābā
Qarā valley.
[1375] f. 4 and note; f. 276. Bābur seems to use the name for
several varieties of deer.
[1376] There is here, perhaps, a jesting allusion to the
darkening of complexion amongst the inhabitants of countries
from west to east, from Highlands to Indian plains.
[1377] In Dr. E. D. Ross' _Polyglot list of birds_ the
_sārigh(sārīq)-qūsh_ is said to frequent fields of ripening
grain; this suggests to translate its name as Thief-bird.
[1378] _Aquila chrysaetus_, the hunting eagle.
[1379] This _ārālīgh_ might be identified with the "Miankalai"
of maps (since Soghd, lying between two arms of the Zar-afshān
is known also as Mīānkal), but Raverty explains the Bajaur
Miankalai to mean Village of the holy men (_mīān_).
[1380] After 933 AH. presumably, when final work on the B.N.
was in progress.
[1381] Mr. Erskine notes that Pesh-grām lies north of Mahyar
(on the Chandāwal-water), and that he has not found Kahrāj (or
Kohrāj). Judging from Bābur's next movements, the two valleys
he names may be those in succession east of Chandāwal.
[1382] There is hardly any level ground in the cleft of the
Panj-kūra (R.'s _Notes_ p. 193); the villages are perched high
on the sides of the valley. The pass leading to them may be
Katgola (Fincastle's Map).
[1383] This account of Hind-āl's adoption is sufficiently
confused to explain why a note, made apparently by Humāyūn,
should have been appended to it (Appendix L, _On Hind-āl's
adoption_). The confusion reminds the reader that he has
before him a sort of memorandum only, diary jottings, apt to
be allusive and abbreviated. The expected child was Dil-dār's;
Māhīm, using her right as principal wife, asked for it to be
given to her. That the babe in question is here called Hind-āl
shews that at least part of this account of his adoption was
added after the birth and naming (f. 227).
[1384] One would be, no doubt, for Dil-dār's own information.
She then had no son but had two daughters, Gul-rang and
Gul-chihra. News of Hind-āl's birth reached Bābur in Bhīra,
some six weeks later (f. 227).
[1385] f. 218_b_.
[1386] Bībī Mubāraka, the Afghānī Aghācha of Gul-badan. An
attractive picture of her is drawn by the
_Tāwārikh-i-ḥāfi-i-raḥmat-khānī_. As this gives not only one
of Bābur's romantic adventures but historical matter, I append
it in my husband's translation [(A.Q.R. April 1901)] as
Appendix K, _An Afghān Legend_.
[1387] _Bī-sūt aīlī-nīng Bajaur-qūrghānī-dā manāsabatī-bār
jīhatī_; a characteristic phrase.
[1388] Perhaps the end of the early spring-harvest and the
spring harvesting-year. It is not the end of the campaigning
year, manifestly; and it is at the beginning of both the solar
and lunar years.
[1389] Perhaps, more than half-way between the Mid-day and
Afternoon Prayers. So too in the annals of Feb. 12th.
[1390] _tīl ālghālī_ (Pers. _zabān-gīrī_), a new phrase in the
B.N.
[1391] _chāsht_, which, being half-way between sunrise and the
meridian, is a variable hour.
[1392] See n. 2, f. 221.
[1393] Perhaps Maqām is the Mardān of maps.
[1394] Bhīra, on the Jehlam, is now in the Shāhpūr district of
the Panj-āb.
[1395] This will be the ford on the direct road from Mardān
for the eastward (Elphin-stone's _Caubul_ ii, 416).
[1396] The position of Sawātī is represented by the Suābī of
the G. of I. map (1909 AD.). Writing in about 1813 AD. Mr.
Erskine notes as worthy of record that the rhinoceros was at
that date no longer found west of the Indus.
[1397] Elph. MS. _ghura_, the 1st, but this is corrected to
16th by a marginal note. The Ḥai. MS. here, as in some other
places, has the context for a number, but omits the figures.
So does also the Elph. MS. in a good many places.
[1398] This is the Harru. Mr. Erskine observes that Bābur
appears to have turned sharp south after crossing it, since he
ascended a pass so soon after leaving the Indus and reached
the Sūhān so soon.
[1399] _i.e._ the Salt-range.
[1400] Mr. Erskine notes that (in his day) a _shāhrukhī_ may
be taken at a shilling or eleven pence sterling.
[1401] It is somewhat difficult not to forget that a man who,
like Bābur, records so many observations of geographical
position, had no guidance from Surveys, Gazetteers and Books
of Travel. Most of his records are those of personal
observation.
[1402] In this sentence Mr. Erskine read a reference to the
Musalmān Ararat, the Koh-i-jūd on the left bank of the Tigris.
What I have set down translates the Turkī words but, taking
account of Bābur's eye for the double use of a word, and
Erskine's careful work, done too in India, the Turkī may imply
reference to the Ararat-like summit of Sakeswar.
[1403] Here Dr. Leyden's version finally ends (Erskine).
[1404] Bhīra, as has been noted, is on the Jehlam; Khūsh-āb is
40 m. lower down the same river; Chīnīūt (Chīnī-wat?) is 50
miles south of Bhīra; Chīn-āb (China-water?) seems the name of
a tract only and not of a residential centre; it will be in
the Bar of Kipling's border-thief. Concerning Chīnīūt _see_ D.
G. Barkley's letter, JRAS 1899 p. 132.
[1405] _ṯaur yīrī waqī` būlūb tūr._ As on f. 160 of the valley
of Khwesh, I have taken _ṯaur_ to be Turkī, complete, shut in.
[1406] _chashma_ (f. 218_b_ and note).
[1407] The promised description is not found; there follows a
mere mention only of the garden [f. 369]. This entry can be
taken therefore as shewing an intention to write what is still
wanting from Ṣafar 926 AH. to Ṣafar 932 AH.
[1408] Mīr Muḥ. may have been a kinsman or follower of Mahdī
Khwāja. The entry on the scene, unannounced by introduction as
to parentage, of the Khwāja who played a part later in Bābur's
family affairs is due, no doubt, to the last gap of annals. He
is mentioned in the Translator's Note, _s.a._ 923 AH. (_See_
Gul-badan's H.N. Biographical Appendix _s.n._)
[1409] or Sihrind, mod. Sirhind or Sar-i-hind (Head of Hind).
It may be noted here, for what it may be found worth, that
Kh(w)āfī Khān [i, 402] calls Sar-i-hind the old name, says
that the place was once held by the Ghaznī dynasty and was its
Indian frontier, and that Shāh-jahān changed it to Sahrind.
The W.-i-B. I.O. 217 f. 155 writes Shahrind.
[1410] Three krores or crores of dāms, at 40 to the rupee,
would make this 750,000 rupees, or about £75,000 sterling
(Erskine); a statement from the ancient history of the rupī!
[1411] This Hindustānī word in some districts signifies the
head man of a trade, in others a landholder (Erskine).
[1412] In Mr. Erskine's time this sum was reckoned to be
nearly £20,000.
[1413] Here originally neither the Elph. MS. nor the Ḥai. MS.
had a date; it has been added to the former.
[1414] This rain is too early for the s.w. monsoon; it was
probably a severe fall of spring rain, which prevails at this
season or rather earlier, and extends over all the west of
Asia (Erskine).
[1415] _az ghīna shor sū._ Streams rising in the Salt-range
become brackish on reaching its skirts (G. of I.).
[1416] Here this will be the fermented juice of rice or of the
date-palm.
[1417] _Rauḥ_ is sometimes the name of a musical note.
[1418] a platform, with or without a chamber above it, and
supported on four posts.
[1419] so-written in the MSS. Cf. Raverty's _Notes_ and G. of
I.
[1420] Anglicé, cousins on the father's side.
[1421] The G. of I. describes it.
[1422] Elph. MS. f. 183b, _manṣūb_; Ḥai. MS. and 2nd W.-i-B.
_bīsūt_. The holder might be Bābā-i-kābulī of f. 225.
[1423] The 1st Pers. trs. (I.O. 215 f. 188b) and Kehr's MS.
[Ilminsky p. 293] attribute Hātī's last-recorded acts to Bābur
himself. The two mistaken sources err together elsewhere. M.
de Courteille corrects the defect (ii, 67).
[1424] night-guard. He is the old servant to whom Bābur sent a
giant _ashrafī_ of the spoils of India (Gul-badan's H.N.
_s.n._).
[1425] The _kīping_ or _kīpik_ is a kind of mantle covered
with wool (Erskine); the root of the word is _kīp_, dry.
[1426] _aūlūgh chāsht_, a term suggesting that Bābur knew the
_chota ḥāẓirī_, little breakfast, of Anglo-India. It may be
inferred, from several passages, that the big breakfast was
taken after 9 a.m. and before 12 p.m. Just below men are said
to put on their mail at _chāsht_ in the same way as, _passim_,
things other than prayer are said to be done at this or that
Prayer; this, I think, always implies that they are done after
the Prayer mentioned; a thing done shortly before a Prayer is
done "close to" or "near" or when done over half-way to the
following Prayer, the act is said to be done "nearer" to the
second (as was noted on f. 221).
[1427] _Juldū Dost Beg-nīng ātī-gha būldī._
[1428] The disarray of these names in the MSS. reveals
confusion in their source. Similar verbal disarray occurs in
the latter part of f. 229.
[1429] Manifestly a pun is made on the guide's name and on the
_cap-à-pié_ robe of honour the offenders did not receive.
[1430] _aūrdū-nīng aldī-gha_, a novel phrase.
[1431] I understand that the servants had come to do their
equivalent for "kissing hands" on an appointment _viz._ to
kneel.
[1432] spikenard. Speede's _Indian Handbook on Gardening_
identifies _saṃbhal_ with _Valeriana jatmansi_ (Sir W. Jones &
Roxburgh); "it is the real spikenard of the ancients, highly
esteemed alike as a perfume and as a stimulant medicine;
native practitioners esteeming it valuable in hysteria and
epilepsy." Bābur's word _dirakht_ is somewhat large for the
plant.
[1433] It is not given, however.
[1434] _i.e._ through the Indus.
[1435] Perhaps this _aīkī-sū-ārāsī_ (_miyān-dū-āb_) was the
angle made by the Indus itself below Atak; perhaps one made by
the Indus and an affluent.
[1436] _ma'jūnī nāklīkī_, presumably under the tranquillity
induced by the drug.
[1437] _massadus_, the six sides of the world, _i.e._ all
sides.
[1438] This is the name of one of the five champions defeated
by Bābur in single combat in 914 AH. (Translator's Note _s.a._
914 AH.).
[1439] f. 145_b_.
[1440] Humāyūn was 12, Kāmrān younger; one surmises that Bābur
would have walked under the same circumstances.
[1441] _ṣabuḥī_, the morning-draught. In 1623 AD. Pietro della
Vallé took a _ṣabuḥī_ with Mr. Thomas Rastel, the head of the
merchants of Surat, which was of hot spiced wine and sipped in
the mornings to comfort the stomach (Hakluyt ed. p. 20).
[1442] f. 128 and note.
[1443] Anglicé, in the night preceding Tuesday.
[1444] f. 106b.
[1445] This would be the under-corselet to which the four
plates of mail were attached when mail was worn. Bābur in this
adventure wore no mail, not even his helm; on his head was the
under cap of the metal helm.
[1446] Index s.n. _gharīcha_.
[1447] The earlier account helps to make this one clearer (f.
106b).
[1448] f. 112 _et seq._