Firishta's History (Gulshan-i Ibrāhīmī) 78.5.8

78.5.8

upon seeing which, the minister, after repeating the verse of the Koran, "O God, verily this is a great forgery," said, "The seal is mine, but not the letter, of which I have no knowledge." He concluded, by repeating the following verse: "By that God whose commands have been fulfilled by the just, even at the expense of their blood, false as the story of Yoosoof and the wolf is that which my enemies have forged against me." The King being at the time intoxicated with wine, had resigned his reason to fury, and as the decline of the house of Bahmuny was also to be soon completed, he went into no further examination, but rising from his seat, ordered his Abyssinian slave Jowhur to put the minister to death on the spot. Khwaja Mahmood, addressing the King, said, "The death of an old man like me is, indeed, of little moment, but to your Majesty it will be the loss of an empire, and the ruin of your character." The King, without attending to him, went abruptly into his haram. The slave then drawing his sabre advanced towards the Khwaja, who, kneeling down facing the Kibla, said, "There is no God but God, and Mahomed is the prophet of God." As the sabre descended he exclaimed, "Praise be to God," and thus resigned his soul to the divine mercy. Asud Khan Geelany, an officer of high rank, and a friend of the Khwaja, happening to be present, was put to death by the slave also, without orders. Thus died Khwaja Mahmood Gawan, in the seventy-eighth year of his age.