The Memoirs of Bābur 913.1.2

913.1.2

Riding at night from Sar-i-dih, we crossed the plain of Kattawāz in the dark, a quite black night, one level stretch of land, no mountain or rising-ground in sight, no known road or track, not a man able to lead us! In the end I took the lead. I had been in those parts several times before; drawing inferences from those times, I took the Pole-star on my right shoulder-blade[1249] and, with some anxiety, moved on. God brought it right! We went straight to the Qīāq-tū and the Aūlābā-tū torrent, that is to say, straight for Khwāja Ismā`īl _Sirītī_ where the Ghiljīs were lying, the road to which crosses the torrent named. Dismounting near the torrent, we let ourselves and our horses sleep a little, [Sidenote: Fol. 203b.] took breath, and bestirred ourselves at shoot of dawn. The Sun was up before we got out of those low hills and valley-bottoms to the plain on which the Ghiljī lay with a good _yīghāch_[1250] of road between them and us; once out on the plain we could see their blackness, either their own or from the smoke of their fires.