"What he was to me, child, thou wilt know hereafter, perhaps soon now; but no matter! In the great King Ibrahim I had a friend who loved me. Since him there have been two Kings, and the present one, whom I may be spared to see, bears his name. And yet, O once beloved master, my heart is even now with thee in the grave, where I must follow thee; and I bless Thee, O my Lord, that I have learned to forgive even through my child."
On the western side of the cemetery was the embankment of an irrigation lake of some considerable area, and the rain having fallen plentifully, it was full of water. Then they went and sat by it, and the soft south-west wind brought the tiny waves to their feet, and sighed in the noble trees which shaded the cemetery and the college. They had brought a slight refection with them, and ate it together, while the old Dervish discoursed on the mysteries of holiness, or told many a tale of the past, when he, in King Ibrahim's suite, had halted for the day and performed ceremonies at the tombs of his ancestors, while the ground for the college was being measured and the architect explained the work he proposed to undertake. They attended the afternoon prayer in the college, which was filled to overflowing with the people and soldiers from the town; and our old friend addressed them in one of his loving, persuasive sermons, in which, perhaps from the unlooked-for occurrences of the day, he was even more eloquent than ever.
The Fatehas at the Kings' tombs could not be made ready that day, and as their companions had no objection, but, indeed, the contrary, they remained and formed a little procession to the cemetery, spending a day of quiet peace, such as Zóra thoroughly enjoyed. She used to say long afterwards, when she was an old woman, that her second day at Gogi was one of the happiest of her life, because one of the most thoughtful and impressive; and how sweet it had been to her to find her beloved grandfather's mind softening to an habitual cheerfulness and submission. "Truly," as he said constantly to her, "truly, child, I feel as if the Lord were leading me in this Turreequt, and that, too, by means of thee, O beloved! from the first."
The country from Gogi to Gulburgah is uninteresting, but very fertile and well cultivated, and for some portion of their first march many of the Royal cavalry and townspeople escorted them; for the fame of our old friend had gone before him, and all were desirous of paying him honour and receiving his blessing. Crossing the Bheema river by the ferry at Ferozabad, Zóra saw the palace fort of the famous King Feroze Shah, situated on a high bank of the river above one of its long deep reaches. But it is now only a ruin, and was even then in poor condition; and towards the close of the following day the minarets and domes of the holy city of Gulburgah were in sight, and it was quickly reached.
Nothing could persuade our old friend that it should be treated like an ordinary town. His heart was full of reverence and thankfulness at having reached the end of his pilgrimage in safety and honour, and his new friend was equally reverential. So within a mile of the entrance gate they dismounted from their litters and performed a prostration ceremony by the wayside, and walked on together, Zóra, as was her wont, dressed in her pilgrim's dress, leading her grandfather. Near the gate the old man had his sheet spread for alms, and it was not till the time for evening prayer was nigh that he arose and, guided by one of the Musháekh's servants, followed his friend to the final place of destination, which was in a suburb which belonged to the spiritual Prince of the place, the descendant of the Geesoo Duráz family, who reigned. The noise and bustle of the crowded Bazar was therefore avoided.
Zóra, whose ideas of a city were of the most limited practical nature, and to whom Sugger, Shahpoor, and Gogi had appeared immense, was fairly confounded when, in company with her new friend, they ascended to the terrace of the house which had been assigned to them by the Prince. Before them were the fine mausoleums and domes of the original Geesoo Duráz, and the cemeteries attached to them, the Prince's palace and pretty gardens, with their fine rows of cyprus trees. In the middle distance the massive group of the mausoleums of the Bahmuny Kings, standing apart on an elevated piece of ground, and forming a picturesque group, with the still populous city lying at their feet; while to the left was the strong fort, with its regular fortifications, and beyond a considerable artificial lake, which the King Feroze, the merry Monarch of Dekhan history, had had constructed for his aquatic amusements.
Gulburgah was, however, an ancient city, for when Zuffir Khan, the Viceroy of the then Emperor of Dehly, Mahomed Toghluk, founded the Bahmuny dynasty in A.D. 1347, the old Hindoo city was selected by him as his capital in the Dekhan, and continued to be so until, in 1435, nearly a century afterwards, a new city was built at Beeder, which was finally adopted as the seat of the Royal Government. During a hundred years of prosperity, however, under the early portion of the dynasty, Gulburgah had become a rich and thriving city. It was the mart for local produce and importations from the coast. Merchants of Arabia and Persia, nay, of Turkey and the Levant, resided there, and the courts of the early Bahmunies were magnificent and wealthy. Thus the city was ornamented with many public buildings, caravanseras, and mosques, almshouses, hospitals, and the like, and the fort constructed there was by far the strongest and most regular in the Dekhan; and within it the great mosque, which was to have been the exact counterpart of that at Cordova, in Spain, was begun, and roofed in; but never completed.