3 In the famous Memoirs, pp. 302-3, is to be found the following note, inserted by Humáyún: 'At this same station,' the station of Sháhábád, on the left bank of the Sarsutí, reached on the march to Pánípat, 'and this same day,' March 6, 1526, 'the razor or scissors were first applied to Humáyún's beard. As my honoured father mentioned in these commentaries the time of his first using the razor, in humble emulation of him I have commemorated the same circumstance regarding myself. I was then eighteen years of age. Now that I am forty-six, I, Muhammad Humáyún, am transcribing a copy of these Memoirs from the copy in his late Majesty's own handwriting.'
The expedition of Humáyún was completely successful. He conquered the country as far as the frontiers of Bihár. On his return, January 6th, 1527, Bábar subdued Biána and Dholpur, took by stratagem the fortress of Gwalior, received information of the surrender of Múltán. Then, master of the country from the Indus to the frontiers of Western Bihár, and from Kálpi and Gwalior to the Himálayas, he turned his attention to the famous Ráná of Chitor, Ráná Sanga. On February 11 he marched from Agra to encounter the army of this prince, who, joined by Muhammadan auxiliaries of the Lodí party, had advanced too, and had encamped at Bisáwar, some twelve miles from Biána and some sixty-two, by that place, from Agra. Bábar advanced to Síkrí, now Fatehpur-Síkrí, and halted. In some skirmishes which followed the Rájpúts had all the advantage, and a great discouragement fell on the soldiers of Bábar. He contented himself for the moment with making his camp as defensible as possible, and by sending a party to ravage Mewát.
Cooped up in camp, discouraged by the aspect of affairs, Bábar, uneasy at the forced inaction, passed in review the events of his life, and recognised with humility and penitence that throughout it he had habitually violated one of the strictest injunctions of the Kurán, that which forbids the drinking of wine. He resolved at once to amend. Sending then for his golden wine-cups and his silver goblets he had them destroyed in his presence, and gave the proceeds of the sale of the precious metal to the poor. All the wine in the camp was rendered undrinkable or poured on the ground. Three hundred of his nobles followed his example.
Sensible at length that the situation could not be prolonged, Bábar, on March 12th, advanced two miles towards the enemy, halted, and again advanced the day following to a position he had selected as favourable to an engagement. Here he ranged his troops in order of battle. On the 16th the Rájpúts and their allies advanced, and the battle joined. Of it Bábar has written in his memoirs a picturesque and, doubtless, a faithful account. It must suffice here to say that he gained a victory so decisive,4 that on the morrow of it Rájpútána lay at his feet. He at once pushed on to Biána, thence into Mewát, and reduced the entire province to obedience. But the effects of his victory were not limited to conquests achieved by himself. Towns in the Duáb which had revolted, returned to their allegiance or were recovered. When the Duáb had been completely pacified Bábar turned his arms, first, against the Hindu chiefs of Central India, the leader of whom was at the time the Rájá of Chandérí. He had reached the town and fortress of that name when information came to him that his generals in the east had been unfortunate, and had been compelled to fall back from Lucknow upon Kanauj. Unshaken by this intelligence, the importance of which he admitted, he persevered in the siege of Chandérí, and in a few days stormed the fortress. Having secured the submission of the country he marched rapidly eastward, joined his defeated generals near Kanauj, threw a bridge across the Ganges near that place, drove the enemy—the remnant of the Lodí party—before him, re-occupied Lucknow, crossed the Gúmtí and the Gogra, and forced the dispirited foe to disperse. He then returned to Agra to resume the threads of the administration he was arranging.
4 Ráná Sanga was severely wounded, and the choicest chieftains of his army were slain. The Ráná died the same year at Baswa on the frontiers of Mewát.
But he was not allowed time to remain quiet. The old Muhammadan party in Jaunpur had never been effectively subdued. The rich kingdom of Behar, adjoining that of Jaunpur, had, up to this time, been unassailed. And now the Muhammadan nobles of both districts combined to place in the hands of a prince of the house of Lodí—the same who had aided Sanga Ráná against Bábar—the chief authority in the united kingdom. The conspiracy had been conducted with so much secrecy that the result of it only reached Bábar on the 1st of February, 1529. He was then at Dholpur, a place which he greatly affected, engaged with his nobles in laying out gardens, and otherwise improving and beautifying the place. That very day he returned to Agra, and taking with him such troops as he had at hand, marched the day following to join his son Askarí's army, then at Dakdakí, a village near Karra,5 on the right bank of the Ganges. He reached that place on the 27th, and found Askarí's army on the opposite bank of the river. He at once directed that prince to conform his movements on the left bank to those of his own on the right.
5 Karra is now in ruins. It is in the tahsil or district of the same name in the Allahábád division. In the times of Bábar and Akbar it was very prosperous.
The news which reached Bábar here was not of a nature to console. The enemy, to the number of a hundred thousand, had rallied round the standard of Máhmud Lodí; whilst one of his own generals, Sher Khán, whom he had distinguished by marks of his favour, had joined the insurgents and had occupied Benares with his division. Máhmud Lodí was besieging Chanar, twenty-six miles from the sacred city.
Bábar immediately advanced, compelled Máhmud Lodí to raise the siege of Chanar, forced Sher Khán to evacuate Benares and re-cross the Ganges, and, crossing the Karamnása, encamped beyond Chausá, at the confluence of that river and the Ganges, and Baksar. Marching thence, he drove his enemy before him until he reached Arrah. There he assumed the sovereignty of Behar, and there he learned that Máhmud Lodí, attended by but a few followers, had taken refuge with the King of Bengal.
Nasrat Sháh, King of Bengal, had married a niece of Máhmud Lodí. He had entered into a kind of convention with Bábar that neither prince was to invade the territories of the other, but, despite this convention, he had occupied the province of Sáran or Chaprá, and had taken up with his army a position near the junction of the Gogra with the Ganges, very strong for defensive purposes. Bábar resolved to compel the Bengal army to abandon that position. There was, he soon found, but one way to accomplish that end, and that was by the use of force. Ranging then his army in six divisions, he directed that four, under his son Askarí, then on the left bank of the Ganges, should cross the Gogra, march upon the enemy, and attempt to draw them from their camp, and follow them up the Gogra; whilst the two others, under his own personal direction, should cross the Ganges, then the Gogra, and attack the enemy's camp, cutting him off from his base. The combination, carried out on the 6th of May, entirely succeeded. The Bengal army was completely defeated, and the victory was, in every sense of the word, decisive. Peace was concluded with Bengal on the conditions that the province, now known as Western Behar, should be ceded to Bábar; that neither prince should support the enemies of the other, and that neither should molest the dominions of the other.