The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)
[2480] _jībachī._ Bābur's injunction seems to refer to the
maintaining of the corps and the manufacture of armour rather
than to care for the individual men involved.
[2481] Either the armies in Nīl-āb, or the women in the
Kābul-country (f. 375).
[2482] Perhaps what Bābur means is, that both what he had said
to `Abdu'l-lāh and what the quatrain expresses, are dissuasive
from repentance. Erskine writes (_Mems._ p. 403) but without
textual warrant, "I had resolution enough to persevere"; de
Courteille (_Mems._ ii, 390), "_Voici un quatrain qui exprime
au juste les difficultés de ma position._"
[2483] The surface retort seems connected with the jacket,
perhaps with a request for the gift of it.
[2484] Clearly what recalled this joke of Banāī's long-silent,
caustic tongue was that its point lay ostensibly in a baffled
wish—in `Alī-sher's professed desire to be generous and a
professed impediment, which linked in thought with Bābur's
desire for wine, baffled by his abjuration. So much Banāī's
smart verbal retort shows, but beneath this is the
_double-entendre_ which cuts at the Beg as miserly and as
physically impotent, a defect which gave point to another jeer
at his expense, one chronicled by Sām Mīrzā and translated in
Hammer-Purgstall's _Geschichte von schönen Redekünste
Persiens_, art. CLV. (Cf. f. 179-80.)—The word _mādagī_ is
used metaphorically for a button-hole; like _nā-mardī_, it
carries secondary meanings, miserliness, impotence, _etc._
(Cf. Wollaston's _English-Persian Dictionary_ _s.n._
button-hole, where only we have found _mādagī_ with this
sense.)
[2485] The 1st Pers. trs. expresses "all these jokes", thus
including with the double-meanings of _mādagī_, the jests of
the quatrain.
[2486] The 1st Pers. trs. fills out Bābur's allusive phrase
here with "of the _Wālidiyyah_". His wording allows the
inference that what he versified was a prose Turkī translation
of a probably Arabic original.
[2487] Erskine comments here on the non-translation into
Persian of Bābur's letters. Many MSS., however, contain a
translation (f. 348, p. 624, n. 2 and E.'s n. f. 377_b_).
[2488] Anglicé, Thursday after 6 p.m.
[2489] What would suit measurement on maps and also Bābur's
route is "Jumoheen" which is marked where the Sarāī
Bāburpūr-Atsu-Phaphand road turns south, east of Phaphand
(I.S. Map of 1900, Sheet 68).
[2490] var. _Qabāq_, _Qatāk_, _Qanāk_, to each of which a
meaning might be attached. Bābur had written to Humāyūn about
the frontier affair, as one touching the desired peace (f.
359).
[2491] This will refer to the late arrival in Āgra of the
envoy named, who was not with his younger brother at the feast
of f. 351_b_ (f. 357, p. 641, n. 2).—As to T̤ahmāsp's style,
see f. 354, f. 358.
[2492] Shāh-qulī may be the ill-informed narrator of f. 354.
[2493] Both are marked on the southward road from Jumoheen
(Jumandnā?) for Auraiya.
[2494] The old Kālpī _pargana_ having been sub-divided,
Dīrapūr is now in the district of Cawnpore (Kānhpūr).
[2495] That this operation was not hair-cutting but
head-shaving is shewn by the verbs T. _qīrmāq_ and its Pers.
trs. _tarāsh kardan_. To shave the head frequently is common
in Central Asia.
[2496] This will be Chaparghatta on the
Dīrapūr-Bhognīpūr-Chaparghatta-Mūsanagar road, the affixes
_kada_ and _ghatta_ both meaning house, temple, _etc._
[2497] Māhīm, and with her the child Gul-badan, came in
advance of the main body of women. Bābur seems to refer again
to her assumption of royal style by calling her Walī, Governor
(f. 369 and n.). It is unusual that no march or halt is
recorded on this day.
[2498] or, Ārampūr. We have not succeeded in finding this
place; it seems to have been on the west bank of the Jumna,
since twice Bābur when on the east bank, writes of coming
opposite to it (_supra_ and f. 379). If no move was made on
Tuesday, Jumāda II. 6th (cf. last note), the distance entered
as done on Wednesday would locate the halting-place somewhere
near the Akbarpūr of later name, which stands on a road and at
a ferry. But if the army did a stage on Tuesday, of which
Bābur omits mention, Wednesday's march might well bring him
opposite to Hamirpūr and to the "Rampur"-ferry. The verbal
approximation of Ārampūr and "Rampur" arrests attention.—Local
encroachment by the river, which is recorded in the District
Gazetteers, may have something to do with the disappearance
from these most useful books and from maps, of _pargana_
Ādampūr (or, Ārampūr).
[2499] _tūshlāb._ It suits best here, since solitude is the
speciality of the excursion, to read _tūshmāk_ as meaning to
take the road, Fr. _cheminer_.
[2500] _da`wī bīla_; _Mems._ p. 404, challenge; _Méms._ ii,
391, _il avait fait des façons_, a truth probably, but one
inferred only.
[2501] This will be more to the south than Kūra Khas, the
headquarters of the large district; perhaps it is "Koora
Khera" (? Kūra-khirāj) which suits the route (I.S. Map, Sheet
88).
[2502] Perhaps Kunda Kanak, known also as "Kuria, Koria, Kura
and Kunra Kanak" (_D.G. of Fatḥpūr_).
[2503] Haswa or Hanswa. The conjoint name represents two
villages some 6m. apart, and is today that of their
railway-station.
[2504] almost due east of Fatḥpūr, on the old King's Highway
(_Bādshāhī Sar-rāh_).
[2505] His ancestors had ruled in Jūnpūr from 1394 to 1476
AD., his father Ḥusain Shāh having been conquered by Sl.
Sikandar _Lūdī_ at the latter date. He was one of three rivals
for supremacy in the East (_Sharq_), the others being
Jalālu'd-dīn _Nūhānī_ and Maḥmūd _Lūdī_,—Afghāns all three.
Cf. Erskine's _History of India, Bābur_, i, 501.
[2506] This name appears on the I.S. Map, Sheet 88, but too
far north to suit Bābur's distances, and also off the Sarāī
Munda-Kusār-Karrah road. The position of Naubasta suits
better.
[2507] Sher Khān was associated with Dūdū Bībī in the charge
of her son's affairs. Bābur's favours to him, his son
Humāyūn's future conqueror, will have been done during the
Eastern campaign in 934 AH., of which so much record is
missing. Cf. _Tārīkh-i-sher-shāhī_, E. & D.'s _History of
India_, iv, 301 _et seq._ for particulars of Sher Khān (Farīd
Khān _Sūr Afghān_).
[2508] In writing "Sl. Maḥmūd", Bābur is reporting his
informant's style, he himself calling Maḥmūd "Khān" only (f.
363 and f. 363_b_).
[2509] This will be the more northerly of two Kusārs marked as
in Karrah; even so, it is a very long 6 _kurohs_ (12m.) from
the Dugdugī of the I.S. Map (cf. n. _supra_).
[2510] _bīr pāra āsh u ta`ām_, words which suggest one of
those complete meals served, each item on its separate small
dish, and all dishes fitting like mosaic into one tray. T.
_āsh_ is cooked meat (f. 2 n. 1 and f. 343_b_); Ar. _ta`ām_
will be sweets, fruit, bread, perhaps rice also.
[2511] The _yaktāī_, one-fold coat, contrasts with the
_dū-tāhī_, two-fold (A.-i-A. Bib. Ind. ed., p. 101, and
Blochmann's trs. p. 88).
[2512] This acknowledgement of right to the style Sulṯān
recognized also supremacy of the Sharqī claim to rule over
that of the Nūḥānī and _Lūdī_ competitors.
[2513] _mīndīn bītī tūrgān waqāī'._ This passage Teufel used
to support his view that Bābur's title for his book was
_Waqāī`_, and not _Bābur-nāma_ which, indeed, Teufel describes
as the _Kazaner Ausgabe adoptirte Titel_. _Bābur-nāma_,
however, is the title [or perhaps, merely scribe's name]
associated both with Kehr's text and with the Ḥaidarābād
Codex.—I have found no indication of the selection by Bābur of
any title; he makes no mention of the matter and where he uses
the word _waqāī`_ or its congeners, it can be read as a common
noun. In his colophon to the _Rāmpūr Dīwān_, it is a parallel
of _ash`ār_, poems. Judging from what is found in the _Mubīn_,
it may be right to infer that, if he had lived to complete his
book—now broken off _s.a._ 914 AH. (f. 216_b_)—he would have
been explicit as to its title, perhaps also as to his grounds
for choosing it. Such grounds would have found fitting mention
in a preface to the now abrupt opening of the _Bābur-nāma_ (f.
1_b_), and if the _Malfūzāt-i-tīmūrī_ be Tīmūr's authentic
autobiography, this book might have been named as an ancestral
example influencing Bābur to write his own. Nothing against
the authenticity of the _Malfūzāt_ can be inferred from the
circumstance that Bābur does not name it, because the preface
in which such mention would be in harmony with _e.g._ his
_Walidiyyah_ preface, was never written. It might accredit the
_Malfūzāt_ to collate passages having common topics, as they
appear in the _Bābur-nāma_, _Malfūzāt-i-tīmūrī_ and
_Z̤afar-nāma_ (cf. E. & D.'s H. of I. iv, 559 for a discussion
by Dr. Sachau and Prof. Dowson on the _Malfūzāt_). (Cf. Z.D.M.
xxxvii, p. 184, Teufel's art. _Bābur und Abū'l-faẓl_;
Smirnow's Cat. of _Manuscrits Turcs_, p. 142; Index _in loco_
_s.nn._ _Mubīn_ and Title.)
[2514] Koh-khirāj, Revenue-paying Koh (H. G. Nevill's _D. G.
of Allāhābād_, p. 261).
[2515] _kīma aīchīdā_, which suggests a boat with a cabin, a
_bajrā_ (_Hobson-Jobson_ _s.n._ budgerow).
[2516] He had stayed behind his kinsman Khwāja Kalān. Both, as
Bābur has said, were descendants of Khwāja `Ubaidu'l-lāh
_Aḥrārī_. Khwāja Kalān was a grandson of Aḥrārī's second son
Yahyā; Khwāja `Abdu'sh-shahīd was the son of his fifth, Khwāja
`Abdu'l-lāh (Khwājagān-khwāja). `Abdu'sh-shahīd returned to
India under Akbar, received a fief, maintained 2,000 poor
persons, left after 20 years, and died in Samarkand in 982
AH.-1574-5 AD. (A.-i-A., Blochmann's trs. and notes, pp. 423,
539).
[2517] f. 363, f. 363_b_.
[2518] Not found on maps; OOjani or Ujahni about suits the
measured distance.
[2519] Prayāg, Ilāhābād, Allāhābād. Between the asterisk in my
text (_supra_) and the one following "ford" before the
foliation mark f. 364, the Ḥai. MS. has a _lacuna_ which, as
being preceded and followed by broken sentences, can hardly be
due to a scribe's skip, but may result from the loss of a
folio. What I have entered above between the asterisks is
translated from the Kehr-Ilminsky text; it is in the two
Persian translations also. Close scrutiny of it suggests that
down to the end of the swimming episode it is not in order and
that the account of the swim across the Ganges may be a
survival of the now missing record of 934 AH. (f. 339). It is
singular that the Pers. trss. make no mention of Pīāg or of
Sīr-auliya; their omission arouses speculation, as to in which
text, the Turkī or Persian, it was first tried to fill what
remains a gap in the Ḥai. Codex. A second seeming sign of
disorder is the incomplete sentence _yūrtgha kīlīb_, which is
noted below. A third is the crowd of incidents now standing
under "Tuesday". A fourth, and an important matter, is that on
grounds noted at the end of the swimming passage (p. 655 n. 3)
it is doubtful whether that passage is in its right place.—It
may be that some-one, at an early date after Bābur's death,
tried to fill the _lacuna_ discovered in his manuscript, with
help from loose folios or parts of them. Cf. Index _s.n._
swimming, and f. 377_b_, p. 680 n. 2.
[2520] The Chaghatāī sulṯāns will have been with `Askarī east
of the Ganges.