Tadhkirah i Anand-Ram “Mukhlish” 1.2

1.2

The settlement of the conquered territory occupied the Emperor for four months and a half. The march was then continued to Jalalabad, a place famous for its pomegranates, which was reached on the 14th of Sha'ban. Násir Khán, son of the late Nasir Khan, governor of the province, who during these events had been at Peshawar, moved from this town and occupied a position half-way between 'Ali Masjid and Jamrud, which place is distant nine kos from Peshawar, to oppose the invader's progress. Nasir Khan had often written to Muhammad Shah concerning the want of money, but none of his representations had been attended to. He now wrote to the effect that he himself was but as a rose-bush withered by the blasts of autumn, while his soldiery were no more than a faded pageant, ill-provided and without spirit; he begged that, of the five years' salary due to him, one year's salary might be paid, that he might satisfy his creditors and have some little money at his command. The Nawab Sahib, however, exclaimed before the assembled díwán, that he could see no need for all this haste and flurry; "had he not written on the subject to the Emperor and the Wakálat-panáh, and, if the matter was not settled that day, why it would be so the next?" The Wakálat-panáh, when he laid the document before the Amiru-l umard Bahadur, and told him, with fear and trembling, in the Persian language, what had occurred in Kabul, received an answer which drove him to his wits' end;