These Mughūls had for chiefs men who when Sa‘īd went to Andijān, elected to stay with Bābur. One of the three named by Ḥaidar was Ayūb Begchīk. He repented his disloyalty; when he lay dying some two years later (920 AH.) in Yāngī-ḥiṣār, he told Sa‘īd Khān who visited him, that what was “lacerating his bowels and killing him with remorse”, was his faithlessness to Bābur in Ḥiṣār, the oath he had broken at the instigation of those “hogs and bears”, the Mughūl chiefs (T.R. p. 315).
In this year but before the Mughūl treachery to Bābur, Ḥaidar left him, starting in Rajab (Sep.-Oct.) to Sa‘id in Andijān and thus making a beginning of his 19 years spell of service.
919 AH.-MARCH 9th 1513 to FEB. 26th 1514 AD.
Bābur may have spent this year in Khishm (Ḥ.S. iii, 372). During two or three months of it, he had one of the Shāh’s retainers in his service, Khwāja Kamālu’d-dīn Maḥmūd, who had fled from Ghaj-davān to Balkh, heard there that the Balkhīs favoured an Aūzbeg chief whose coming was announced, and therefore went to Bābur. In Jumāda 11 (August), hearing that the Aūzbeg sultan had left Balkh, he returned there but was not admitted because the Balkhīs feared reprisals for their welcome to the Aūzbeg, a fear which may indicate that he had taken some considerable reinforcement to Bābur. He went on into Khurāsān and was there killed; Balkh was recaptured for the Shāh by Deo Sult̤ān, a removal from Aūzbeg possession which helps to explain how Bābur came to be there in 923 AH.
920 AH.—FEB. 26th 1514 to FEB. 15th 1515 AD.
Ḥaidar writes of Bābur as though he were in Qūndūz this year (TR. p. 263), says that he suffered the greatest misery and want, bore it with his accustomed courtesy and patience but, at last, despairing of success in recovering Ḥiṣār, went back to Kābul. Now it seems to be that he made the stay in Khwāst to which he refers later (f. 241b) and during which his daughter Gul-rang was born, as Gul-badan’s chronicle allows known.
It was at the end of the year, after the privation of winter therefore, that he reached Kābul. When he re-occupied Samarkand in 917 AH., he had given Kābul to his half-brother Nāṣir Mīrzā; the Mīrzā received him now with warm welcome and protestations of devotion and respect, spoke of having guarded Kābul for him and asked permission to return to his own old fief Ghaznī. His behaviour made a deep impression on Bābur; it would be felt as a humane touch on the sore of failure.
921 AH.—FEB. 15th 1515 to FEB. 5th 1516 AD.
a. Rebellion of chiefs in Ghaznī.
Nāṣir Mīrzā died shortly after (dar hamān ayyām) his return to Ghaznī. Disputes then arose amongst the various commanders who were in Ghaznī; Sherīm T̤aghāī was one of them and the main strength of the tumult was given by the Mughūls. Many others were however involved in it, even such an old servant as Bābā of Pashāghar taking part (f. 234b; T.R. p. 356). Ḥaidar did not know precisely the cause of the dispute, or shew why it should have turned against Bābur, since he attributes it to possession taken by Satan of the brains of the chiefs and a consequent access of vain-glory and wickedness. Possibly some question of succession to Nāṣir arose. Dost Beg distinguished himself in the regular battle which ensued; Qāsim Beg’s son Qaṃbar-i-‘alī hurried down from Qūndūz and also did his good part to win it for Bābur. Many of the rioters were killed, others fled to Kāshghar. Sherīm T̤aghāī was one of the latter; as Sa‘īd Khān gave him no welcome, he could not stay there; he fell back on the much injured Bābur who, says Ḥaidar, showed him his usual benevolence, turned his eyes from his offences and looked only at his past services until he died shortly afterwards (T.R. p. 357).[1347]