The Memoirs of Bābur 935.1
The Bābur-nāma in English (A. S. Beveridge) 935.1
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935.1.1
935 AH.-SEP. 15TH 1528 TO SEP. 5TH 1529 AD.[2242] (_a. Arrivals at Court._) (_Sep. 18th_) On Friday the 3rd[2243] of Muḥarram, `Askarī whom I had summoned for the good of Multān[2244] before I moved out for Chandīrī, waited on me in the private-house.[2245] (_Sep. 19th_) Next day waited on me the historian Khwānd-amīr, Maulānā Shihāb[2246] the enigmatist, and Mīr Ibrāhīm the harper a relation of Yūnas-i-`alī, who had all come out of Herī long before, wishing to wait on me.[2247] (_b. Bābur starts for Gūālīār._)[2248] (_Sep. 20th_) With the intention of visiting Gūālīār which in books they write Gālīūr,[2249] I crossed the Jūn at the Other Prayer of Sunday the 5th of the month, went into the fort of Āgra to bid farewell to Fakhr-i-jahān Begīm and Khadīja-sulṯān Begīm who were to start for Kābul in a few days, and got to horse. Muḥammad-i-zamān Mīrzā asked for leave and stayed behind in Āgra. That night we did 3 or 4 _kurohs_ (6-8 m.) of the road, dismounted near a large lake (_kūl_) and there slept.
935.1.2
(_Sep. 21st_) We got through the Prayer somewhat before time (_Muḥ. 6th_) and rode on, nooned[2250] on the bank of the Gamb[h]īr-water[2251], and went on shortly after the Mid-day Prayer. On the way we ate[2252] powders mixed with the flour of parched [Sidenote: Fol. 339b.] grain,[2253] Mullā Rafī` having prepared them for raising the spirits. They were found very distasteful and unsavoury. Near the Other Prayer we dismounted a _kuroh_ (2 m.) west of Dūlpūr, at a place where a garden and house had been ordered made.[2254] (_c. Work in Dūlpūr (Dhūlpūr)._)
935.1.3
That place is at the end of a beaked hill,[2255] its beak being of solid red building-stone (_`imārat-tāsh_). I had ordered the (beak of the) hill cut down (dressed down?) to the ground-level and that if there remained a sufficient height, a house was to be cut out in it, if not, it was to be levelled and a tank (_ḥauẓ_) cut out in its top. As it was not found high enough for a house, Ūstād Shāh Muḥammad the stone-cutter was ordered to level it and cut out an octagonal, roofed tank. North of this tank the ground is thick with trees, mangoes, _jāman_ (_Eugenia jambolana_), all sorts of trees; amongst them I had ordered a well made, 10 by 10; it was almost ready; its water goes to the afore-named tank. To the north of this tank Sl. Sikandar's dam is flung across (the valley); on it houses have been built, and above it the waters of the Rains gather into a great lake. On the east of this lake is a garden; I ordered a seat and four-pillared platform (_tālār_) to be cut out in the solid rock on that same side, and a mosque [Sidenote: Fol. 340.] built on the western one. (_Sept. 22nd and 23rd—Muḥ. 7th and 8th_) On account of these various works, we stayed in Dūlpūr on Tuesday and Wednesday. (_d. Journey to Gūālīār resumed._)
935.1.4
(_Sep. 24th_) On Thursday we rode on, crossed the Chaṃbal-river and made the Mid-day Prayer on its bank, between the two Prayers (the Mid-day and the Afternoon) bestirred ourselves to leave that place, passed the Kawārī and dismounted. The Kawārī-water being high through rain, we crossed it by boat, making the horses swim over. (_Sep. 25th_) Next day, Friday which was 'Āshūr (_Muḥ. 10th_), we rode on, took our nooning at a village on the road, and at the Bed-time Prayer dismounted a _kuroh_ north of Gūālīār, in a Chār-bāgh ordered made last year.[2256] (_Sep. 26th_) Riding on next day after the Mid-day Prayer, we visited the low hills to the north of Gūālīār, and the Praying-place, went into the fort[2257] through the Gate called Hātī-pūl which joins Mān-sing's buildings (_`imārāt_[2258]), and dismounted, close to the Other Prayer, at those (_`imāratlār_)[2259] of Rāja Bikramājīt in which Raḥīm-dād[2260] had settled himself. To-night I elected to take opium because of ear-ache; another reason was the shining of the moon.[2261] (_e. Visit to the Rājas' palaces._) (_Sep. 27th_) Opium sickness gave me much discomfort next day (_Muḥ. 12th_); I vomited a good deal. Sickness notwithstanding, I visited the buildings (_`imāratlār_) of Mān-sing and [Sidenote: Fol. 340b.] Bikramājīt thoroughly.
935.1.5
They are wonderful buildings, entirely of hewn stone, in heavy and unsymmetrical blocks however.[2262] Of all the Rājas' buildings Mān-sing's is the best and loftiest.[2263] It is more elaborately worked on its eastern face than on the others. This face may be 40 to 50 _qārī_ (yards) high,[2264] and is entirely of hewn stone, whitened with plaster.[2265] In parts it is four storeys high; the lower two are very dark; we went through them with candles.[2266] On one (or, every) side of this building are five cupolas[2267] having between each two of them a smaller one, square after the fashion of Hindūstān. On the larger ones are fastened sheets of gilded copper. On the outside of the walls is painted-tile work, the semblance of plantain-trees being shewn all round with green tiles. In a bastion of the eastern front is the Hātī-pūl,[2268] _hātī_ being what these people call an elephant, _pūl_, a gate. A sculptured image of an elephant with two drivers (_fīl-bān_)[2269] stands at the out-going (_chīqīsh_) of this Gate; it is exactly like an elephant; from it the gate is called Hātī-pūl. A window in the [Sidenote: Fol.
935.1.6
341.] lowest storey where the building has four, looks towards this elephant and gives a near view of it.[2270] The cupolas which have been mentioned above are themselves the topmost stage (_murtaba_) of the building;[2271] the sitting-rooms are on the second storey (_ṯabaqat_), in a hollow even;[2272] they are rather airless places although Hindūstānī pains have been taken with them.[2273] The buildings of Mān-sing's son Bikramājīt are in a central position (_aūrta dā_) on the north side of the fort.[2274] The son's buildings do not match the father's. He has made a great dome, very dark but growing lighter if one stays awhile in it.[2275] Under it is a smaller building into which no light comes from any side. When Raḥīm-dād settled down in Bikramājīt's buildings, he made a rather small hall [_kīchīkrāq tālārghīna_] on the top of this dome.[2276] From Bikramājīt's buildings a road has been made to his father's, a road such that nothing is seen of it from outside and nothing known of it inside, a quite enclosed road.[2277] After visiting these buildings, we rode to a college Raḥīm-dād [Sidenote: Fol. 341b.] had made by the side of a large tank, there enjoyed a flower-garden[2278] he had laid out, and went late to where the camp was in the Chārbāgh. (_f. Raḥīm-dād's flower-garden._)
935.1.7
Raḥīm-dād has planted a great numbers of flowers in his garden (_bāghcha_), many being beautiful red oleanders. In these places the oleander-flower is peach,[2279] those of Gūālīār are beautiful, deep red. I took some of them to Āgra and had them planted in gardens there. On the south of the garden is a large lake[2280] where the waters of the Rains gather; on the west of it is a lofty idol-house,[2281] side by side with which Sl. Shihābu'd-dīn Aīltmīsh (Altamsh) made a Friday mosque; this is a very lofty building (_`imārat_), the highest in the fort; it is seen, with the fort, from the Dūlpūr-hill (_cir._ 30 m. away). People say the stone for it was cut out and brought from the large lake above-mentioned. Raḥīm-dād has made a wooden (_yīghāch_) _tālār_ in his garden, and porches at the gates, which, after the Hindūstānī fashion, are somewhat low and shapeless. (_g. The Urwāh-valley._)
935.1.8
(_Sep. 28th_) Next day (_Muḥ. 13th_) at the Mid-day Prayer we rode out to visit places in Gūālīār we had not yet seen. We saw the _`imārat_ called Bādalgar[2282] which is part of Mān-sing's fort (_qila`_), went through the Hātī-pūl and across the fort to a place called Urwā (Urwāh), which is a valley-bottom (_qūl_) on its western side. Though Urwā is outside the fort-wall running along the top of the hill, it has two stages (_murtaba_) of high wall at its mouth. The higher of these walls is some 30 or 40 _qārī_ (yards) high; this is the longer one; at each end it joins [Sidenote: Fol. 342.] the wall of the fort. The second wall curves in and joins the middle part of the first; it is the lower and shorter of the two. This curve of wall will have been made for a water-thief;[2283] within it is a stepped well (_wā'īn_) in which water is reached by 10 or 15 steps. Above the Gate leading from the valley to this walled-well the name of Sl. Shihābu'd-dīn Aīltmīsh (Altamsh) is inscribed, with the date 630 (AH.-1233 AD.). Below this outer wall and outside the fort there is a large lake which seems to dwindle (at times) till no lake remains; from it water goes to the water-thief. There are two other lakes inside Urwā the water of which those who live in the fort prefer to all other.