The History of Fīrūz Shāh (ʿAfīf) 34: Sixteenth Mukaddama. — Arrival of the Sultan at Dehli. Erection of kabbas (pavilions for public rejoicings).

34

[Rejoicings at Dehli.] The author has been informed that the town of Fírozábád was not yet populous, and neither the kushk (palace) nor the fort was erected, yet one kabba was erected there. On the day the Sultan entered Dehli, * * * the seventy-three elephants, in gorgeous trappings, preceded him like a flock of sheep * * * into the Kushk-i Humáyún, without any drivers. * *
The Sultan employed himself at Dehli in State affairs. Among his other qualities, he had a remarkable fondness for history. Just at this time Maulána Ziáu-d dín Barní, the author of the Táríkh-i Fíroz Sháhí died, and the Sultan expressed to every learned man the great desire he felt for an historical record of the events of his own reign. When he despaired of getting such a work written, he caused the following lines, of his own composition (az zabán-i khwesh), to be inscribed in letters of gold on the walls ('imárat) of the Kushk-i Shikár-rav, and on the domes of the Kushk-i nuzul, and the walls ('imárat) of the minarets of stone which are within the Kushk-i Shikár-rav at Fírozábád : —
"I made a great hunt of elephants, and I captured so many : "I performed many glorious deeds ; and all this I have done "That in the world and among men ; in the earth and among mankind, these verses "May stand as a memorial to men of intelligence, and that the people of the world, and the wise men of the age, may follow the example."