For the moment splendour and prosperity surrounded the boy. But when winter came, Humáyún, who meanwhile had recovered Badakshán, resolved to pass the coldest months of the year at Kílá Zafar, in that province. But on his way thither he was seized with an illness so dangerous that his life was despaired of. He recovered indeed after two months' strict confinement to his bed, but, in the interval, many of his nobles, believing his end was assured, had repaired to the courts of his brothers, and Kámrán, aided by troops supplied by his father-in-law, had regained Kábul, and, with Kábul, possession of the person of Akbar. One of the first acts of the conqueror was to remove Atká Khán from the person of the prince, and to replace him by one of his own servants.
But Humáyún had no sooner regained his strength than he marched to recover his capital. Defeating, in the suburbs, a detachment of the best troops of Kámrán, he established his head-quarters on the Koh-Akabain which commands the town, and commenced to cannonade it. The fire after some days became so severe and caused so much damage that, to stop it, Kámrán sent to his brother to declare that unless the fire should cease, he would expose the young Akbar on the walls at the point where it was hottest.2 Humáyún ordered the firing to cease. He continued the siege, however, and on the 28th of April (1547) entered the city a conqueror. Kámrán had escaped the previous night.
2 Abulfazl relates in the Akbarnáná that the prince actually was exposed, and Haidar Mirzá, Badauní, Ferishtá, and others follow him; but Bayazid, who was present, though he minutely describes other atrocities in his memoirs, does not mention this; whilst Jouher, in his private memoirs of Humáyún, a translation of which by Major Charles Stewart appeared in 1832, states the story as I have given it in the text.
Kámrán had fled to Badakshán. Thither Humáyún followed him. But, in the winter that followed, some of his most powerful nobles revolted, and deserted to Kámrán. Humáyún, after some marches and countermarches, determined in the summer of 1548 to make a decisive effort to settle his northern dominions. He marched, then, in June from Kábul, taking with him Akbar and Akbar's mother. On reaching Gulbahan he sent back to Kábul Akbar and his mother, and marching on Talikán, forced Kámrán to surrender. Having settled his northern territories the Emperor, as he was still styled, returned to Kábul.
He quitted it again, in the late spring of 1549, to attempt Balkh, in the western Kunduz territory. The Uzbeks, however, repulsed him, and he returned to Kábul for the winter of 1550. Then ensued a very curious scene. Kámrán, whose failure to join Humáyún in the expedition against Balkh had been the main cause of his retreat, and who had subsequently gone into open rebellion, had, after Humáyún's defeat, made a disastrous campaign on the Oxus, and had sent his submission to Humáyún. That prince, consigning the government of Kábul to Akbar, then eight years old, with Muhammad Kásim Khán Birlás as his tutor, marched from the capital to gain possession of the person of his brother. So careless, however, were his movements that Kámrán, who had planned the manoeuvre, surprised him at the upper end of the defile of Kipchak, and forced him to take refuge in flight. During the flight Humáyún was badly wounded, but nevertheless managed to reach the top of the Sirtan Pass in safety. There he was in comparative security. Meanwhile Kámrán had marched upon and captured Kábul, and, for the third time, Akbar found himself a prisoner in the hands of his uncle. Humáyún did not submit tamely to this loss. Rallying his adherents, he recrossed the mountains, and marched on the city. Arriving at Shutargardan he saw the army of Kámrán drawn up to oppose him. After some days of fruitless negotiation for a compromise Humáyún ordered the attack. It resulted in a complete victory and the flight of Kámrán. For a moment Humáyún feared lest Kámrán should have carried his son with him in his flight. But, before he could enter the city, he was intensely relieved by the arrival in camp of Akbar, accompanied by Hásán Akhtá, to whose care he had been entrusted. The next day he entered the city.
This time the conquest was decisive and lasting. In the distribution of awards which followed Humáyún did not omit his son. He bestowed upon Akbar as a jaghír the district of Chirkh, and nominated Hájí Muhammad Khán of Sístán as his minister, with the care of his education. During the year that followed the causes of the troubles of Humáyún disappeared one by one. Kámrán indeed once more appeared in arms, but only to be hunted down so vigorously that he was forced to surrender (August, 1553). He was exiled to Mekka, where he died four years later. Hindal Mirzá, another brother, had been slain some eighteen months before, during the pursuit of Kámrán. Askarí Mirzá, the other brother, in whose nature treachery seemed ingrained, had been exiled to Mekka in 1551,3 and though he still survived he was harmless. Relieved thus of his brothers, Humáyún contemplated the conquest of Kashmír, but his nobles and their followers were so averse to the expedition that he was forced, unwillingly, to renounce it. He consoled himself by crossing the Indus. Whilst encamped in the districts between that river and the Jehlam he ordered the repair, tantamount to a reconstruction on an enlarged plan, of the fort at Pesháwar. He was contemplating even then the invasion of India, and he was particularly anxious that he should possess a point d'appui beyond the passes on which his army could concentrate. He pushed the works so vigorously that the fort was ready by the end of the year (1554). He then returned to Kábul. During the winter and early spring that followed, there came to a head in Hindustán the crisis which gave him the opportunity of carrying his plans into effect.
3 He died there in 1558.