Muntakhab al-tawarikh 79.30
Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig) 79.30
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79.30.1
They all conformed to the four degrees of the Faith, and received appointments as Commanders of from One Hundred to Five Hundred. They gave up their beards in the earnest pursuit of the new religion, and became hairless and beardless, and “ Some shavers ” was found to give the date. These new-religionists behaved like Hindus turned Musalmāns, and like one who is dressed in red clothes, and in his conceit looks at his relatives, who say to him (P. 405) : — “ My little man, these rags will be old to-morrow, But the Islām will still remain on your neck.” Aḥmad “ the little Ṣūfī ” is the same who claimed to be the pupil, or rather the perfect successor of Shaikh Aḥmad Bikrī of Egypt. He said, that at the express desire of that religious leader of the age he had come to India, and the Shaikh had frequently told him, to assist the Sultān of India, should he make a slip, and to lead him back from his place of danger. But the opposite was the result: — “ A boastful spider said : I am so very clever, That it would be only right if to-morrow I were made “ Weaver by appointment to the Houris.” Hast not heard what another spider said to him ? Brother, why boast ? first weave, then boast ! ”
79.30.2
The issue of the affair of Gosālah Banārasī, who was a catamite of “ a calf in bodily shape, and lowing,” was as follows: Through the intervention of Shaikh Abu-l-Faẓl he was brought into proximity to the Emperor, and by deceit and trickery getting himself made Krorī of Banāras he managed to leave the Court. He in company with Aḥmad the little Ṣūfī set his eyes on a certain prostitute, and having left a considerable sum of money with her appointed a guardian over her, and went away. When the overseers of the prostitutes and dancing-girls represented this to the Emperor, one night at the New Year’s assembly he allowed the matter to transpire, and took away the jagir of Two-Hundred from Ahmad Sufli, and Mulla Shah Muhammad, which they held conjointly in the skirts of the mountains, and recalled Gosalah of Banaras.
79.30.3
On the tenth of the month of Safar of this year the King of Poets, Shaikh Faizi, after suffering for a long time from conflicting diseases, viz., from the trouble of a difficulty in breathing, and from dropsy and swelling of the hands and feet, and from a vomiting of blood, which he had borne for six months, passed from this world. And since he had, in despite of Mussalmans, associated and been mixed up with dogs day and night, they say that at the moment of death they heard him bark like a dog. And through his bigotry in the matter of heresy and denial of the religion of Islam, he involuntarily at that moment even in the presence of men of learning, lawyers and ascetics, uttered meaningless words and such foolish gibberish, and stuff and nonsense, and unbelief in religious matters, as he was accustomed to, and in which he had formerly so persisted. At length he went to his own place, and a mnemotynon for the date is “Woe to the heretic, and Shi‘ah, and natural-philosopher, and the worldly man,” and another “The pillar of heresy is broken.” And one of his friends invented this mnemotynon:— “Seest thou what a number of tricks the Heaven plays, The bird of my heart out of its cage became a nightingale. That bosom, which treasured in itself a whole world, Became too contracted to draw half a breath.”
79.30.4
At the time of his last agony the Emperor came in the middle of the night and took up his head and caressed it. Several times he cried out and said: “O Shaikh Ji I have brought Hakim 'Ali with me, why do you say nothing?” But since he was unconscious no voice or sound proceeded from him. When the Emperor had repeatedly questioned him, he cast his turban on the ground. And after he had given some words of sympathy to Shaikh Abu-l-Fazl the Emperor went away. Just about this time news was brought that Faizi had breathed his last. — “O God make us firm, make us to die and raise us again in the Faith and the Islam !” A few days after this event Hakim Human died on the sixth of Rabi‘-ul-awwal, and on the seventh Kamālai Çadr passed away. The riches of both of these were at once [confiscated and] locked up in chambers, so that they were too poor to afford themselves a shroud.
79.30.5
These are some of the events of various dates, which in the month of Çafar (may God conclude it in happiness and success!) of the year one thousand and four (1004) of the era of the Hijrah, which corresponded to the fortieth from the Accession, were written down in a concise form by the shikastah pen of this broken-hearted one, and without reservation have been strung unceremoniously on the string of narration. But, although with respect to details it is but as a bubble from the sea of Uman, or like a drop from the clouds or the rain, everything that I have written is as far as I am conscious deliberately guarded from every trace of error, unless (God’s will be done !) in the case of some years a postdating or antedating, or inversion or alteration may have crept into the original Sources, which is not the business of the compiler. And if my span of life give me a little assistance, and the divine grace be my companion, and my brain have leisure from other occupations (if the glorious God will) I will write also a compendium of the events of the years to come. And if not, any one, who is an inhabitant of India, can after us compose a rough epitome, for such has always been the Law of God : — “ My object has been to give good advice, I have spoken, I commit it to God, and go my way.” FINIS.