Muntakhab al-tawarikh 1.11

1.11

Since the object of my ambition is to write correctly, if I should by accident let fall from my pen the instrument of my thoughts, or commit in my thoughts, which are the motive agent of my pen, any slip or error, I hope that He (may He be glorified and exalted) in accordance with His universal mercy which is of old, will overlook and pardon it. By speaking evil do not change my tongue, And do not make this tongue of mine my wrong. And since the first of the Emperors of Islām who were the cause of the conquest of Hindūstān—(after Mahomed Qāsim, cousin and son-in-law of Hajjaj-ibn-Yusuf Saqfi, who in the year, 93 A.H., (711 A.D.), conquered the countries of Sind, Multan and Gujrat; and, by the order of Walid ibn-'Abdul Malik Marwani who on an important occasion wrote to him from Damascus and summoned him to his presence, starting from Oodypur in India, and wrapping himself in a raw hide, while on his journey yielded up his life to God, and after him the affairs of Islam in that became the seat of Government, so that Islam never again lost its hold on that country—deemed it right to commence this history with an account of that monarch whose end was glorious, so that it may be fortunate from the first, and lauded at the last—and God is the best of helpers and defenders.