Note 52 — Feast of the Second New Year.

News came that S͟hāh Beg K͟hān, the governor of Qandahar, had reached the parganah of S͟hor,52 which is his jagir. I determined to give Kabul to him and return to Hindustan. A petition came from Rāja Bīrsing-deo that he had made a prisoner of his nephew, who had been creating a disturbance and had killed many of his men. I ordered him to send him to the fort of Gwalior to be imprisoned there. The parganah of Gujrāt53 in the Panjab Sarkār I bestowed on S͟hīr K͟hān, the Afghan. I promoted Chīn Qilīj, son of Qilīj K͟hān, to the rank of 800 personal and 500 horse. On the 12th I sent for K͟husrau and ordered them to take the chains off his legs that he might walk in the S͟hahr-ārā garden. My fatherly affection would not permit me to exclude him from walking in the aforesaid garden. I transferred the fort of Attock and that neighbourhood from Aḥmad Beg to Z̤afar K͟hān. To Taj K͟hān, who was nominated to beat back the Afghans of Bangas͟h, I gave 50,000 rupees. On the 14th I gave ʿAlī K͟hān Kaṛorī,54 who was one of my revered father’s old servants and was the dārog͟ha of the Naqārak͟hāna (drum-house), the title of Naubat K͟hān, and promoted him to the rank of 500 personal and 200 horse. I made Rām Dās ātālīq to Mahā Singh, grandson of Rāja Mān Singh, who had also been nominated to drive back the rebels of Bangas͟h. On Friday, the 18th, the wazn-i-qamarī (the weighing according to the lunar year) for my 40th year took place. On that day the assembly was held when two watches of the day had passed. I gave 10,000 rupees of the money of the weighing to ten of my confidential servants to divide amongst those who deserved it and the needy. On this day a petition came from Sardār K͟hān, governor of Qandahar, by way of Hazāra and G͟haznīn, in twelve days; its purport was that the ambassador of S͟hāh ʿAbbās, who had started for the Court, had entered the Hazāra55 (country). The Shah had written to his own people: “What seeker of occasion and raiser of strife has come against Qandahar without my order? Perhaps he does not know what is our connection with H.M. Sult̤ān Tīmūr, and especially with Humāyūn and his glorious descendants. If they by chance should have taken the country into their possession they should hand it to the friends and servants of my brother Jahāngīr Pāds͟hāh and return to their own abodes.” I determined to tell S͟hāh Beg K͟hān to secure the Ghaznin road in such a way that travellers from Qandahar might reach Kabul with ease. At the same time I appointed Qāẓī Nūru-d-dīn to the Ṣadārat of the province of Malwah and Ujjain. The son of Mīrzā S͟hādmān Hazāra and grandson of Qarācha K͟hān, who was one of the influential Amirs of Humāyūn, waited on me. Qarācha K͟hān had married a woman from the Hazāra tribe, and this son56 had been born by her. On Saturday, the 19th, Rānā S͟hankar, son of Rānā Ūday Singh, was promoted to the rank of 2,500 personal and 1,000 horse. An order was given for the rank of 1,000 personal and 600 horse for Rāy Manohar. The S͟hinwārī Afghans brought a mountain ram the two horns of which had become one and had become like a rang’s horns. The same Afghans killed and brought a mārk͟hūr (Erskine translates this ‘a serpent-eating goat’), the like of which I had never seen or imagined. I ordered my artists to paint him. He weighed four Hindustani maunds; the length of his horns was 1½ gaz.57 On Sunday, the 27th, I gave the rank of 1,500 personal and 1,000 horse to S͟hajāʿat K͟hān, and the ḥawīlī (district surrounding) of Gwalior was placed in the jagir of Iʿtibār K͟hān. I appointed Qāẓī ʿIzzatu-llah with his brothers to the Bangas͟h duty. At the end of the same day a petition came to me from Islām K͟hān from Agra, together with a letter which Jahāngīr Qulī K͟hān had written to him from Bihar. Its purport was that on the 3rd Ṣafar (30th May, 1607), after the first watch, ʿAlī Qulī Istājlū had wounded Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān at Bardwan, in the province of Bengal, and that he had died when two watches of the same night had passed. The details of this matter are that the aforesaid ʿAlī Qulī was sufrachī (table servant) to S͟hāh Ismāʿīl (the 2nd), ruler of Iran; after his death he took to flight through his natural wickedness and habit of making mischief, and came to Qandahar, and having met at Multan the K͟hānk͟hānān, who had been appointed to the charge of the province of Tulamba,58 started with him for that province. The K͟hānk͟hānān in the field59 placed him among the servants of the late king (Akbar), and he having performed services in that campaign was promoted to a rank in accordance with his condition, and was a long time in the service of my revered father. At the time when he (Akbar) went in prosperity to the provinces of the Deccan, and I was ordered against the Rānā, he came and became servant to me. I gave him the title of S͟hīr-afgan (tiger-throwing). When I came from Allahabad to wait on my revered father, on account of the unfriendliness that was shown me, most of my attendants and people were scattered abroad, and he also at that time chose to leave my service. After my accession, out of generosity I overlooked his offences, and gave an order for a jagir for him in the Subah of Bengal. Thence came news that it was not right to leave such mischievous persons there, and an order went to Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān to send him to Court, and if he showed any futile, seditious ideas, to punish him. The aforesaid K͟hān had reason to know him (his character), and with the men he had present, immediately the order arrived, went hastily to Bardwan, which was his jagir. When he (S͟hīr-afgan) became aware of the arrival of Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān, he went out to receive him alone with two grooms. After he arrived and entered into the midst of his army (his camp) the aforesaid K͟hān surrounded him. When from this proceeding on the part of Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān a doubt arose in his mind, he by way of deceiving him said: “What proceeding is this of thine?”60 The aforesaid K͟hān, keeping back his own men, joined him alone in order to explain the purport of the order to him. Seeing his opportunity he immediately drew his sword and inflicted two or three severe wounds upon him. Amba K͟hān Kas͟hmīrī, who was descended from the rulers of Kashmir and was connected (by marriage?) with the aforesaid K͟hān, and had a great regard for him by way of loyalty and manliness, rushed forward and struck a heavy blow on ʿAlī Qulī’s head, and that vicious fellow inflicted a severe wound on Amba K͟hān with the point of his sword.61 When they saw Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān in this state, his men attacked him (S͟hīr-afgan), and cut him in pieces and sent him to hell. It is to be hoped that the place of this black-faced scoundrel will always be there. Amba K͟hān obtained martyrdom on the spot, and Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān Koka after four watches attained the mercy of God in his quarters. What can I write of this unpleasantness? How grieved and troubled I became! Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān Koka was to me in the place of a dear son, a kind brother, and a congenial friend. What can one do with the decrees of God? Bowing to destiny I adopted an attitude of resignation. After the departure of the late King and the death of that honoured one, no two misfortunes had happened to me like the death of the mother of Qut̤bu-d-dīn K͟hān Koka and his own martyrdom.