O Thou the Exalter of the pillars of Islām, Helper of thy faithful minister, Overthrower of the pedestals of idols, Overcomer of rebellious foes, Exterminator to the uttermost of the followers of darkness!
Lauds be to God the Lord of the worlds, and may the blessing of God be upon the best of His creatures Muḥammad, Lord of ghāzīs and champions of the Faith, and upon his companions, the pointers of the way, until the Day of judgment.
The successive gifts of the Almighty are the cause of frequent praises and thanksgivings, and the number of these praises and thanksgivings is, in its turn, the cause of the constant succession of God’s mercies. For every mercy a thanksgiving is due, and every thanksgiving is followed by a mercy. To render full thanks is beyond men’s power; the mightiest are helpless to discharge their obligations. Above all, adequate thanks cannot be rendered for a benefit than which none is greater in the world and nothing is more blessed, in the world to come, to wit, victory over most powerful infidels and dominion over wealthiest heretics, “these are the unbelievers, the wicked.”[2041] In the eyes of the judicious, no blessing can be greater than this. Thanks be to God! that this great blessing and mighty boon, which from the cradle until now has been the real object of this right-thinking mind (Bābur’s), has now manifested itself by the graciousness of the King of the worlds; the Opener who dispenses his treasures without awaiting solicitation, hath opened them with a master-key before our victorious Nawāb (Bābur),[2042] so that the names of our[2043] conquering heroes have been emblazoned in the records of glorious ghāzīs. By the help of our victorious soldiers the Fol. 317.standards of Islām have been raised to the highest pinnacles. The account of this auspicious fortune is as follows:—
(b. Rānā Sangā and his forces.)
When the flashing-swords of our Islām-guarded soldiers had illuminated the land of Hindūstān with rays of victory and conquest, as has been recorded in former letters-of-victory,[2044] the Divine favour caused our standards to be upreared in the territories of Dihlī, Āgra, Jūn-pūr, Kharīd,[2045] Bihār, etc., when many chiefs, both pagans and Muḥammadans submitted to our generals and shewed sincere obedience to our fortunate Nawāb. But Rānā Sangā the pagan who in earlier times breathed submissive to the Nawāb,[2046] now was puffed up with pride and became of the number of unbelievers.[2047] Satan-like he threw back his head and collected an army of accursed heretics, thus gathering a rabble-rout of whom some wore the accursed torque (t̤auq), the zīnār,[2048] on the neck, some had in the skirt the calamitous thorn of apostacy.[2049] Previous to the rising in Hindūstān of the Sun of dominion and the emergence there of the light of the Shāhanshāh’s Khalīfate [i.e. Bābur’s] the authority of that execrated pagan (Sangā)—at the Judgment Day he shall have no friend,[2050] was such that not one of all the exalted sovereigns of this wide realm, such as the Sult̤ān of Dihlī, theFol. 317b. Sult̤ān of Gujrāt and the Sult̤ān of Mandū, could cope with this evil-dispositioned one, without the help of other pagans; one and all they cajoled him and temporized with him; and he had this authority although the rājas and rāīs of high degree, who obeyed him in this battle, and the governors and commanders who were amongst his followers in this conflict, had not obeyed him in any earlier fight or, out of regard to their own dignity, been friendly with him. Infidel standards dominated some 200 towns in the territories of Islām; in them mosques and shrines fell into ruin; from them the wives and children of the Faithful were carried away captive. So greatly had his forces grown that, according to the Hindū calculation by which one lak of revenue should yield 100 horsemen, and one krūr of revenue, 10,000 horsemen, the territories subject to the Pagan (Sangā) yielding 10 krūrs, should yield him 100,000 horse. Many noted pagans who hitherto had not helped him in battle, now swelled his ranks out of hostility to the people of Islām. Ten powerful chiefs, each the leader of a pagan host, uprose in rebellion, as smoke rises, and linked themselves, as though Fol. 318.enchained, to that perverse one (Sangā); and this infidel decade who, unlike the blessed ten,[2051] uplifted misery-freighted standards which denounce unto them excruciating punishment,[2052] had many dependants, and troops, and wide-extended lands. As, for instance, Ṣalāḥu’d-dīn[2053] had territory yielding 30,000 horse, Rāwal Ūdai Sīngh of Bāgar had 12,000, Medinī Rāī had 12,000, Ḥasan Khān of Mīwāt had 12,000, Bār-mal of Īdr had 4,000, Narpat Hāra had 7,000, Satrvī of Kach (Cutch) had 6,000, Dharm-deo had 4,000, Bīr-sing-deo had 4,000, and Maḥmūd Khān, son of Sl. Sikandar, to whom, though he possessed neither district nor pargana, 10,000 horse had gathered in hope of his attaining supremacy. Thus, according to the calculation of Hind, 201,000 was the total of those sundered from salvation. In brief, that haughty pagan, inwardly blind, and hardened of heart, having joined with other pagans, dark-fated and doomed to perdition, advanced to contend with the followers of Islām and to destroy the foundations of the law of the Prince of Men (Muḥammad), on whom be God’s blessing! The protagonists of the royal forces fell, like divine destiny, on that one-eyed Dajjāl[2054] who, to understanding men, shewed the truth of the saying, When Fate arrives, the eye becomes blind, and, setting before their eyes the scripture which saith, Whosoever striveth to promote the true religion, striveth for the good of his own soul,[2055]Fol. 318b. they acted on the precept to which obedience is due, Fight against infidels and hypocrites.
(c. Military movements.)
(March 17th, 1527) On Saturday the 13th day of the second Jumāda of the date 933, a day blessed by the words, God hath blessed your Saturday, the army of Islām was encamped near the village of Kānwa, a dependency of Bīāna, hard by a hill which was 2 kurohs (4 m.) from the enemies of the Faith. When those accursed infidel foes of Muḥammad’s religion heard the reverberation of the armies of Islām, they arrayed their ill-starred forces and moved forward with one heart, relying on their mountain-like, demon-shaped elephants, as had relied the Lords of the Elephant[2056] who went to overthrow the sanctuary (ka‘ba) of Islām.