The Nāṣirī Generations 266.3

266.3

At the time when the infidel horsemen reached the base of the fortress, there were in Kal-yun a great number of men and much war material. Sultan Muhammad, Khwarazm Shah, had [previously] beleaguered and pressed hard this fortress and that of Fiwar, which is opposite to it, for a period of ten or eleven years before he obtained possession of them. Kal-yun had [since] been thoroughly provided with men and arms, and stores and provisions. When the Mughal troops began the attack upon it, the holy warriors and tried men within descended from the fortress and commenced holy war upon them, and despatched numbers of Mughals to hell. Day and night they engaged in fighting with and resisting the infidels. The intrepidity of the garrison of the fortress reached such a pitch that it was impossible for the Mughal force to obtain sleep at night out of dread of them, and so these infidels completely enclosed the entire fortress round with a circular wall, in which they placed two gates, facing the fortress, with walls before them, and men were told off to keep watch at night. A trustworthy person related that a fox had remained at the foot of the rock on which the fortress of Kal-yun stands, within the circumvallation of the Mughals, and, for a period of seven months, that fox had no way by which he might get out, so strictly did the Mughal troops guard this wall.