تحفة النظار في غرايب الامصار وعجايب الاسفار 7.2.6

7.2.6

I found that the sultan’s reply had reached them and that he had sent a eunuch named Sunbul, the keeper of the wardrobe, in place of the martyred Kāfūr, with orders to pursue our journey. I found, too, that they had written to the sultan about me, and that they regarded the journey as ill-omened on account of what had happened to me and to Kāfūr, and were wanting to go back. But when I saw that the sultan insisted upon the journey, I urged them on with great determination. They answered: “Do you not see what has befallen us at the very outset of this mission ? The sultan will excuse you, so let us return to him, or stay here until his reply reaches us.” But I said: “ We cannot stay, and wherever we are his reply will overtake us.” We left Koel, therefore, and encamped at Burj Būra [Burjpur], where there is a fine hermitage in which lives a beautiful and virtuous shaykh called Muhammad the Naked, because he wears nothing but a cloth from his navel to the ground. Thence we travelled to the river known as Ab-i Siyah [“Black Water,” Kalindi] and from there reached the city of Qinawj [Kanauj]. It is a large, well-built and strongly fortified city; prices there are cheap and sugar plentiful, and it is surrounded by a great wall. We spent three days here and during this time received the sultan’s reply to the letter about me. It ran thus “ If no trace is found of so-and-so [i.e.