CHAPTER X

"A blow or two and then the Fighting ends,

The Sword seeks Scabbard, and the Warrior wends

Through Death's wide Door. Were it not wiser then

To sleep until Retreat its message sends?"

So, vaguely thought Babar as life went on dully with the family party

at Tashkend. Most of his servants had left from absolute want; one, or

at most two attendants were all that he could muster when he went to

pay his compliments to the Khan, his uncle. Once, indeed, he

accompanied the latter on a foray; but it was a useless sort of

expedition. He, the Khan, took no part, beat no enemy; he simply went

out and came back again.

The young man spent much of his time with his mother who was

convalescing but slowly; and she naturally, after so many years of

absence, saw much of her sisters and cousins; most of them elderly

women, inclined to make much of the handsome young King-errant whose

melancholy never could withstand the faintest joke.

For all that Babar, at the bottom of his heart, was utterly

dissatisfied with himself and his world. Never since the debacle at

Samarkand had he found himself again, the light-hearted, intensely

vital person, who, taking things as they came, could yet turn them to

his own uses. He began to tell himself privately that, rather than

pass his life as he was now doing, homeless and purposeless, it would

be better to retire into some corner where he might live unknown and

undistinguished; that, rather than exist in distress and abasement far

better were it to flee away from the sight of man, so far as his feet

could carry him. In his infancy he remembered he had always had a

strong desire to see China, but had never been able to accomplish his

wish because of being a King and having a duty towards his relations

and connections.

Now he no longer had a throne. Now, his mother--the only tie left, for

Ayesha his wife had never returned to him--was safe with her mother

and her brother.

Now, therefore, was the time. His mother, however, he knew well would

not support the proposition; besides he had still a few followers who,

having attached themselves to him with very different hopes, would be

bitterly disappointed at his project. He could not bear to hurt

anyone's feelings, so he devised a plan in order to get away quietly.

He had never seen his other uncle, the younger Khan of Outer

Moghulistan. Why should he not go, in this slack time, and pay him a

visit?

There seemed, indeed, no reason against this; and Babar was on the

very point of starting when a messenger arrived hot haste, to say that

the younger Khan himself was on his way to see his nephew and his

nephew's mother!

It was a blow; Babar's plan was utterly disconcerted, but being, like

all his race, full of family affection, he set off with ever so many

elderly Khanums with beautiful high-sounding names to meet his uncle.

Such a meeting as it was; so many embracings and kneelings and yet

more embracings; some ceremonious, others quite without form or

decorum. After which the great circle of cousins and aunts, and uncles

and nephews, sat down and continued talking about past occurrences and

old stories till after midnight.

His younger uncle had, according to the custom of his tribe, brought

Babar a complete dress of state. A cap embroidered with gold thread, a

long frock of China satin ornamented with flowered needle-work. A

cuirass of fine chain-mail, Chinese fashion, with a whetstone and a

purse-pocket from which were suspended a lot of little trinkets such

as women wear, including a bag of perfumed earth. He looked very smart

in it indeed, and when he returned to his own, tricked out in all this

finery, they declared it was only by his voice they recognised him;

that they had thought he was some grand young Sultan!

Life at any rate did not seem quite so empty; since the two Khans,

having got together, began to propose a joint expedition to recover

Andijan--_for Babar_, being an understood corollary so long as they

remained under the influence of stern old Isan-daulet, who ruled her

sons in matriarchal fashion.

So they set off with flaunting pennons and kettledrums, after the

manner of Moghul armies, and at their first halt held a muster of

the troops, also in the Moghul fashion. In groups of three, three

horse-tail standards were erected, and from the centre staff of each a

long strip of white cloth was fastened, on the loose end of which

stood the foot of the leader of that division. All around, in a huge

circle, the troops were drawn up. Then with many ceremonials and

sprinklings of mares'-milk spirit, each leader estimated the total

number of the force. The final verdict being received with a wild

war-shout; and then, at full speed, the whole army galloped

centre-wards, the foremost troopers drawing bridle within a foot or

two of the standards. On this occasion Babar looked with a certain

awe, yet some misgiving, at no less than thirty thousand wild horsemen

of the desert.

But he had more certain aid than this. He found that he was not all

forgot in the little valley at the extreme limit of the habitable

world; and the country people welcomed his return with acclaim. So as

soon as he could, with that curious distrust of Moghul blood, which

makes the name given to the dynasty he founded in India so quaintly

ironical, he parted company with his uncle's forces, and pushing on

with such of his own people as had come together, sought for fine

fighting.

And he got it. Still reckless, almost without definite aim, he

followed swift on every opportunity for a skirmish. When he saw a body

of the enemy, he advanced at full gallop without minding order or

array; and in nine cases out of ten the sheer daredevil clash

succeeded. The enemy could not stand the charge and fled without

exchanging blows. But sometimes his ill-luck with the Moghuls pursued

him. Once when he, with his staff, was waiting outside Andijan for the

return of a messenger. It was about the third watch of the night, and

some of them were nodding, others fast asleep on their horses, when

all at once the saddle-drums struck up with martial noise and hubbub.

The few men who were with Babar were seized with a panic and took to

flight; except three, all the rest ran off to a man. In vain these

four galloped after the fugitives; in vain they horsewhipped some of

them.

All their exertions were ineffectual to make them stand.

There was nothing for it but to try and check the pursuers themselves

as best they could. So the four turned, stood and discharged flights

of arrows, until the enemy was almost within sword thrust; then,

wheeling swiftly, they galloped on to take up a fresh position of

offence.

In this way they covered and protected the retreat, until by good

fortune they fell in with a patrol party of their own. Then, of

course, came immediate charge, to discover that the pursuers were

Moghuls from his uncle's force, who were out on a pillaging expedition

of their own! In this manner, by a false alarm, the plan which Babar

had conceived came to nothing, and he had to return after a fruitless

journey.

Truly, if the young man had wished to throw away his life, he could

scarcely have dared Fate more recklessly. More than once he found

himself almost alone facing stupendous odds. Once, when surprised at

night in negligent security without advanced guard and without

_videttes_, he had to gallop out almost unarmed to meet a large body

of the enemy and found himself in the midst of them with but three

supporters. Even so Fate was against him. He drew out of his quiver by

mistake a green-tipped finger guard instead of an arrow, and being

unwilling to throw it away because his uncle the Khan had given it to

him, lost as much time in returning it to its place as would have

sufficed for the despatch of two arrows, and, ere he was ready, his

companions had been swept back by the onslaught and he was alone. To

draw up to his ear and let the foremost foe have it for all he was

worth was easy, but at the same instant an arrow struck him on the

right thigh unsteadying his aim, and the next moment that foremost foe

was on him and smote him such a blow on the head with a sword, that,

despite his steel cap he was nigh stunned. And then, through his

having neglected to clean his sword after swimming a river, it had

rusted a little in the scabbard and he lost time in drawing it. Still,

he won through that time, and, despite continual anxiety and

irritation because of the behaviour of the Moghul troops which his

uncles detached to help him, and who _would_ insist on plundering and

were with difficulty restrained from putting honourable prisoners to

death, he was fairly successful, until a final act of treachery threw

him on his beam ends, and he was forced to retreat, fairly beaten.

He was invited to a parley by the enemy and the Moghuls urged him to

accept the invitation, and by hook or by crook, to seize or murder the

leaders. Babar was indignant. Such artifice and underhand dealing

were, he said, totally abhorrent to his habits and disposition. If he

made an agreement for peaceful interview, he would not violate it.

Nor did he. But whether from perversity or sheer stupidity, his orders

were disobeyed, and he found himself committed to battle in the very

heart of the opponents' defences, and without a sufficient force to

secure success. Even then he challenged Fate, by waiting for personal

retreat a full hour or more, unwilling, as he thought, to leave some

of his friends in danger. Finally news came that having been beaten,

at the other side of the city in about as much time as milk takes to

boil, they, and half Babar's men, had escaped long before by another

gate!

Only about twenty men were left to the young King. It was no longer

season to tarry; they set off, a great band of the enemy's troops in

full pursuit.

And then commenced a memorable ride for life. Man after man dropped

out, maimed by the flights of following arrows.

"Help! Help!" cried a well known voice behind him and Babar instantly

turned bridle to aid a dear friend. But those who rode on either side

the young King would not have it; this was no time to defy Death. It

was the time to keep hold on Life. So, with strong hands upon his

reins, Babar had no choice but to ride on. There were but eight of

them left now; a wearied, hurried band of hunted men struggling

through broken glens remote from the beaten road. The enemy behind was

now out of sight, but, as at sunset the fugitives passed into more

level ground, a shadow darker than the shadows of evening should be,

showed on the plain.

Placing his men under cover, Babar dismounted, and on foot, ascended

an eminence to see what this might be. When suddenly from behind, a

number of horsemen showed coming towards them. It was too dark to see

their number but, doubtless, it must be a detachment in pursuit, and

the only hope flight.

"There is no use, sire," said a noble, "going on thus. They will

outweary and take us all. Better by far, that you and Kali-Gokultash

choose two extra horses from amongst us, your devoted servants; so by

keeping the four horses at full speed you may escape--it is a last

chance."

But Babar shook his head. To leave anyone dismounted in the midst of

the enemy was beyond him; so he set his teeth and rode on.

"The Most High is heavier than I am," urged an entreating voice at his

elbow, "and it is my lord they want, not this slave whose horse is

fairly fresh."

Babar set his teeth again; but he felt the truth of the words and

exchanged horses. Jan-Kali could slip aside down some ravine. They

would not follow him. It was he, Zahir-ud-din Mohamed Babar, that was

wanted.

Again came the plea--"My horse is fresher than the Most High's."

And yet again Babar exchanged steeds.

On and on, the horses flagging, followers dropping out, until but two

remained--the King and his foster-brother Kali-Gokultash.

"Sire!--you had best go on!" muttered the latter as his horse stumbled

and almost fell.

"Whither?" called back the King bitterly. "Come on! be it Life or

Death, let us meet it together."

And ever and ever, as they went on blindly, he paused to look back, to

wait ...

And once, when he looked back there was no one near at hand. Only in

the far distance, coming closer and closer, dark figures--were there

two or more?

But now, alone, hopeless, the worst seemed over. Babar dug spurs into

his horse, weary but willing, and was off with renewed vigour in his

veins. It was himself against the world once more! He would fight it

out to the end--the bitter end!

It was now dark and before him lay a hill. If he could reach it, and

dismount, he might trust to his own nimbleness in climbing. But his

horse was dropping, and two of the pursuers were within bowshot, ere

he could fling himself from his steed on rising ground and dash up a

glen to the right. He did not pause to shoot, though he had arrows in

his quiver. A few of these he had stuck in his belt as he flung off

his accoutrements piece-meal; they were for use at the last--the very

last!

But voices followed him; eager, protesting voices. They were no

enemies; neither were they friends. But they could not leave a King in

such a desolate situation Let him confide in them and he might yet

find safety.

It was a desperate chance; still it was a chance. And there were but

two of them. One brave man could surely keep them in check--or kill

them before he died. Babar pulled up, went back to his horse and faced

Fate. So, all that night, they rode together, and when dawn came, one

of the troopers commandeered some loaves of bread. All that day they

lay watchfully in hiding, and when night came they passed on to a

half-ruined house on the outskirts of a town. Here the troopers

brought Babar an old fur coat; which was welcome, for the nights were

bitterly cold. They also brought him a mess of boiled millet-flour

pottage, which he ate and found wonderfully comfortable.

So comfortable, that having lit a fire, Babar actually fell asleep

beside it, despite his imminent danger, despite his distrust of his

comrades who were for ever whispering amongst themselves. But he was

outwearied after three nights' riding, and two days of watchful

hiding. Indeed when they roused him at dawn on the pretext that there

were spies about, and that a change was imperative, he was so spent

and outdone that he felt inclined to bid them do their worst, or leave

him to his fate. Yet he followed them dully, to a garden on the

outskirts of the town--as well die there as elsewhere.

But it was a primrose dawn, with a promise of brilliant sunshine, and

the garden, partially walled, held a few flowers, a few birds.

It needed no more to re-arouse vitality, and Babar, with fresh vigour

in his veins after his few hours of sleep, began to emerge from the

slough of despondency in which he had passed the last three days.

These would-be guides of his were doubtless traitors; could he escape

them?

The day passed on to noon. Babar, in a corner of the garden, performed

his religious ablutions and recited his prayers, adding to them the

consolations of poetry by repeating the couplet:

"Long or short be your tenancy past

You must quit the Palace-of-Life at last."

That was a self-evident proposition, and as such gave his simple,

clear-sighted soul much comfort. So much so, that he fell asleep under

the trees, and dreamt a dream of victory and triumph.

From which he awoke to find three men standing over him, to hear

whispers of how best to seize and throttle him.

To spring to his feet and face them did not take long.

"Ill-begotten, treacherous hounds!" he cried, ablaze with anger. "So

canst thou dare when Babar sleeps--let us see who will lay hands on

him awake!"

The villains fell back; but at that moment the tramp of horsemen was

heard beyond the garden wall, and one of the trio laughed.

"Crow away, cockerel!" he cried. "Mayhap, hadst thou trusted us at

first we might have let thee escape according to our oath. But now is

the work of death taken out of our hands; for yonder comes a troop to

seize thee and save our promise unbroken."

He turned as he spoke to welcome the newcomers, then started. For the

horsemen hurrying in to the garden were not Babar's foes, but his

friends!

"Kutluk! Babai!" cried the young King, recognising two of his most

devoted adherents. They flung themselves from their horses.

"The King! Long live the King!" they shouted, as bending the knee at a

respectful distance they rushed forward to fall at the feet of their

dear leader.

It had been a wonderful ride for life; yet in a way a needless one, as

Babar told his uncles when he rejoined them. Since, had he but known,

as he afterwards discovered, that the following party was not a whole

detachment, but only a band of twenty troopers, he and his seven would

of course, have made a stand and engaged them with every hope of

success.

Not that it would have made much difference; for both the elder Khan

and the younger one had become weary of their expedition, and on news

of the Great Usbek raider Shaibani's appearance in their country, had

retired in hot haste to their dominions.

So Babar once more was at the end of his tether. The Moghuls he told

his grandmother, to her great dudgeon, were no good as conquerors.

Nature had made them pillagers, and an inch of plunder was worth more

than an ell of honour.

"He is out of joint with life," said his mother, weeping.

Old Isan-daulet sniffed. "Try him with a pretty girl," she suggested.

The Khanum shook her head. "He is not that sort--he will not even

marry and that is nigh shameless--since he is one and twenty, yet

without a child. 'Tis hard indeed on a woman of my age to have no

grandchild."

"Except Dearest-One's boy," said the old woman, her stern face

softening. "Lo! perfidious barbarian though the father be, I should

like to see the child. It should have the makings in it of a man--from

its mother." And she was silent for awhile; perhaps she was thinking

of that night in Samarkand when a girl had waited patiently for worse

than death. Then she spoke:

"See you, daughter! Your boy is not all King, no more than he is all

my grandson. He hath material for half-a-dozen different persons in

him and he hath not yet made choice of which to take. Lo!--mayhap--I

have had too big a hand in the pease-porridge. Let be a bit. Let him

do as he likes for a while and if that be to leave us for the time--so

be it. Hurry not God's work."

It was wise advice. None wiser. So for two whole years, the King was

King-errant indeed. Even whither he went none know. Most likely he

fulfilled his boyhood's desire to see China; but this much is certain.

He and a few intimate friends, not half-a-dozen at most, wandered for

months and months. Over the White Mountains likely, amid eternal

snows, across the high lying steppes to Kashgar, and so onwards.

Or perhaps from Tashkend he may have wandered over high plateaux and

past wide lakes to the Great Tian-Shan mountains. But either way, from

some high peak, he must have caught one glimpse at least of a sight

never to be forgotten. The sight of the wide plain of Eastern

Turkhestan lying like a lake of pale amber beneath an encircling rim

of snowy pearls, that change to rubies in the sunset. Marvellous

indeed! All around the everlasting hills contemptuous of man and his

finite work, glittering icily on that ever-present haze of dust, which

effaced alike, the sand of the central desert, and the faint fringe of

cultivation on the skirts of the hills. Over a thousand feet of golden

dust-pall covering the corpses of the six sand-buried cities of

Khotan!

Buried when, and how? And wherefore, in God's name, did humanity found

its houses on the Moving Sands?

Fine stimulation here, for the imagination of a poet born.

Babar must have sat and looked, sat and learnt from the slow

invincible march of the sand waves piled by the desert winds,

something of the strength of patience. Slow and sure. Under the gentle

call of a summer breeze, mayhap, one sand atom shifting place; then

another and another. But in the end, a high-piled wave, ready to fall

over and engulf what lay beyond, when the whistle of the winter winds

rang over the wastes, rousing the hidden devil in those harmless sand

grains, to whirls of death.

Shifting, shifting; never still for a second. Unearthing there,

burying here.

With what end?

And doubtless Babar heard the oft told tale of the Muazzim of Kar, and

of the minaret of the mosque which the sand can never hide for long;

which even in these later days the dry biting winds of the desert lay

bare, ever and anon, until the golden final of its blue dome shines

bright as ever over the wide plain.

Perhaps,--being a poet born--he may have tried to put the legend into

verse with better success than the following:

The Preacher preached; his words were austere

So was his Life. "Oh! sinners, hear!

I oft have warned you--oft and amain,

Gentle and stern; yet all in vain.

From off my feet by order of God

Shake I the dust in which I've trod.

I rend my garments, go on my way.

Not for my soul His Judgment Day.

No more I preach, no more will I warn;

Wait till the resurrection morn!"

He left the pulpit; garments he rent;

Forth from the Lord's own House he went.

"Thou com'st with me," he said as he strode

Past the Muazzim. "Thine the road

Of Mercy too." The singer bowed,

Bit at his lips, then said aloud:

"The Grace of God I cannot gainsay,

Fain would I go, fain would I stay,

Once more I'd waken sinners to prayer."

Frowning the Priest said "Fool! beware

Our God is Fire! He burns and He rends,

Message of Peace, once only sends."

The singer shivered. "So be it, yet

Prayers must be called from the minaret.

Yet once again singing must rise

Out of the night to dawning skies."

The Preacher spat. "It lies on thy head."

Gripped at his purse; smiled as he fled.

* * * * *

The minaret was slender and high,

Blue was its dome; blue like the sky,

Its gilded finial shone like a star

Over the sinful town of Kar.

The singer climbed its narrowing stair,

Stood in his place, then breathed a prayer:

"O God, most great, no atom of sand

Slips through Thy Fingers' grip; Thy Hand

Heeds not man's worth. Thou fillest his need.

Wake those who sleep, Dear God I plead!"

* * * * *

No star, no moon, the gloom of the night

Making the snow peaks rim with light

The purpling sky, the darkening world.

Was it a sand grain sharp that whirled

To touch the watcher keen on his cheek?

Waiting so patient until a streak

Of cold grey dawn should come to the sky

Bringing the time for clamant cry

"_Ul-sul-lah-to-khair-un-mun-nun-nu!_

_Sleepers! awake! Prayer time has come to you!_

_Awake! Far better Prayer than Sleep to you!_

_Ul-sul-lah-to-khair-un-mun-nun-nu!_"

* * * * *

The night was silent: that was a gust

Wind hot as fire, laden with dust.

The singer wiped salt tears from his eyes--

God! if the sand-storm should arise,

The storm of sand that comes like a pall

Gliding soft as snow flakes to fall

On good, on bad. "Oh! sleepers awake!

Waken and fly!" His voice could make

Small sound against the sound of the storm

Whistling the sand grains, "Rise and form

In serried order! carry the town!

Bury each fool, knave, sinner, clown,

Who sleeps unheeding God's gracious grace,

Mercy is tired. Go! leave no trace

Of saint or sinner within this place."

* * * * *

The singer fought for breath as he prayed.

"Lord! give me one more chance," he said.

And lo! the sand-storm faltered away;

Still as the grave the city lay.

The singer he sang as never before,

Piercing through gateway, wall and door

The clamant cry. "Oh! sleepers rise!

Better is prayer than sleep! Be wise!"

Awakened all; they saw and they fled

Forth from the town, bewildered

Forth from the town, bewildered

To seek for refuge far from the sands

Out of the wind. But still he stands

And still he sings. Perchance there be one

Soul in the town who might be won!

The storm fresh-gathered swept on its task,

Covered all things with deadly mask

Of sand high-piled like waves of the sea

Till there was naught save sand to see.

No soul was left; no need for him more!

Downwards he crept. He found the door

Was blocked by sand waves! Merciful Heav'n!

Not for his soul was ransom given!

So back he went to the minaret

--Stood in the wind, the sandy fret--

Giving the call. It echoes yet

O'er wastes of sand when the sun has set.

When shifting winds in gusts and in whirls

Part of the dead town's shroud unfurls,

When dimly blue the minaret shows

Dim as a lamp its finial glows,

And soft and low and faint as a sigh

Comes to the ear that clamant cry,

"_Ul-sul-lah-to-khair-un-mun-nun-nu!_

_Awake! Awake! Prayer time has come to you!_

_Awake! Better Prayer than Sleep to you!_

_Ul-sul-lah-to-khair-un-mun-nun-nu!_"

BOOK II

BLOSSOM TIME

1504 TO 1511

CHAPTER I

"Youth asked the lark,

'Why dost thou sing

When clouds are darkling?'

Replied the lark,

'Behind the dark

The light is sparkling.'

Youth begged the Hours

Death not to bring

Though clouds were lowering.

Replied the Hours,

'In Heaven's bowers

Roses are flowering.'"

"To-day I will shave," said Babar with conviction; and his long, fine

fingers felt his rather ragged young beard reflectively.

He was altogether a bit ragged after his long wanderings. But he had

come back from them wiser, steadier in mind, still stronger in body.

The record of years of clean, hard living showed in his bright hazel

eyes, and the general alertness of his lithe young body.

But he _was_ ragged! The brilliant June sunshine poured down on the

sorry encampment set out on the summer pasturage of the high alps of

Ilak, and revealed the rents and patches of the two tents which were

all that Babar possessed; his own, terribly tattered in its royalty,

reserved for his mother's use; a common felt tilt, flexible in its

cross-poles, for his own.

And then his followers! Some two hundred in all; mostly on foot with

brogues to them: blanket frocks over their shoulders; clubs in their

hands. A miserable court, indeed, for a Prince of the Blood Royal!

Yet the sense of Kingship rose stronger than ever in the young mind.

"Yea! I will be shaven!" he said, magisterially, and summoned the

court barber. He came running barefoot with a tin basin.

"There should be ceremonials and entertainments," said the Khanum, his

mother, plaintively. "Even at my brothers' first shavings there were

ever illuminations and feastings, and thou art King; but what will

you, here in the wilderness?"

Babar laughed. "One King is as like another King as split peas, when

there is lather to his face, motherling; so quick, barber, image me to

Sulaiman-the-Wise, or Haroun-ul-Raschid. Lo! I could be Emperor as

well as they, were fate but kind."

So, out in the June sunshine, the young man sat while the white lather

foamed up into his eyes and made them smart.

"Have a care! slave," he said sharply. "Lo! I shall see things

cloudy--and I would fain see clear."

See clear! Aye! that was what he wanted. The past was leaving

him--with his beard! He had made up his mind to that. Never again

would he quarrel possession of that sweet valley on the extreme limits

of the habitable world. He would go farther afield; how far

depended--On what? On himself chiefly. So for the present he was on

his way to Khorasan, the centre of civilisation.

Ay! Bare feet and blanket frocks were well enough in boyhood; but when

a man came to his own there were other Kingships to be fought for

besides those which involved a temporal throne. There was Kingship in

thought, Kingship in Art; a dozen or more Kingships ready to be

gripped.

The razor sweeping backwards and forwards, seemed to be shaving away

all the disappointments of his past life; he leapt to his feet when

the business was over and stretched his strong young arms out as if to

embrace the whole world.

"Lo! I feel a new man. I am ready for anything--for everything!"

So, as he stood there, the memory--never very far distant from his

mind in his moments of exaltation--of the Crystal Bowl of Life came

back to him and he sang the last verse, his full voice rolling away

among the hills:

"Clear Crystal Bowl, I laugh as I quaff.

Bring me Life's whole! I won't take the half!

Crystal Bowl, I bid thee bring to me

Joy, Grief, Life, Death."

"Where didst learn that song, sonling?" said his mother, fondly. "And

how well thou singest now! Thou hast learnt much of late, Babar."

"I learnt it," replied her son, his face sobering, "from my cousin

Gharib. Dost know, motherling," he added swiftly, the light coming

back to his eyes, "I learnt more of him than I wist at the time.

Sometimes I think I owe all to him."

"All?" echoed the Khanum, hurt. "Dost owe nothing to me--or at least

to thy grandmother?"

Babar's face showed whimsically reverent. "Oh, yea! Oh, yea!" he

assented readily; "I owe much to my revered grandparent; yet at this

present it shows but little."

And he pointed to the two ragged tents, the two hundred

tatterdemalions. "I would I were a tulip at times," he added

irrelevantly, as he flung himself down on the grass that was all

starred with the blood-red blossoms. "Think of it, motherling! To lie

cosy all winter at your own heart, and when the sun has warmed the

world to unfurl your banner and flaunt it independent--disobedient, if

you choose!"--he rolled over on his stomach to look clear into one

ruby cup--"Yea! little one!" he said patronisingly. "Rightly art thou

called '_na farman_.'[2] Thou holdest thine own treasure secure,

caring for none--yet will I touch it with my hand," and the tip of his

long finger dived into the chalice to touch the stiff stamens, and

come out all covered with pale, yellow pollen. "An augury!" he said

gravely, as he smeared his forehead with the powder of life. "Lo! I am

marked like a Hindu--I shall conquer Hind yet."

---------------------

[Footnote 2: Contempt.]

---------------------

"God forgive thee, child," exclaimed his mother hastily. "Say not such

things--they tempt Providence. Even not thyself to an idolater."

Babar looked contrite. "Yet if I conquer Hind, I cannot kill all my

subjects," he replied thoughtfully. "There is a puzzle for thee,

motherling--how to be true Mussulman and yet not a fool?"

His mother looked at him and shook her head. Dear son as he was,

always loving, always affectionate, he had a bad habit of getting away

from her ken mentally and bodily. It all came of leading such a

wandering life. If only he would marry and settle down. But there

seemed no chance of either.

Yet Fate held the latter to close quarters. It almost seemed as if

that shaving of his beard, that setting aside once and for all of his

boyish aspirations had had a magical effect on Babar's environments;

for within two months, seated at his ease in a splendid tent, he was

writing in his diary:

"The Lord is wonderful in His might! That a man, master of twenty or

thirty thousand retainers, should, in the space of half-a-day, without

battle, without contest, be reduced to give up all to a needy fugitive

like myself, who had only two hundred tatterdemalions at his back (and

they, all in the greatest want); that he should no longer have any

power over his own servants, nor over his own wealth, nor even his own

life, was a wonderful disposition of the Omnipotent!"

Undoubtedly! And as the enemy who was thus discomfited was no less a

person that Khosrau-Shah, the man who had so treacherously caused

Prince Baisanghar to be strangled, it is certain that his lack of

power over his own life was a sore temptation to Babar. The man

undoubtedly deserved death: it was indeed conformable to every law,

human and divine, that such should meet with condign punishment. But

an agreement had been entered into, so he must be left free and

unmolested, and allowed to carry off as much of his personal property

as he could.

For Babar was no promise-breaker. Perhaps also the memory of poor,

miserable Khosrau's appearance when this pompous man (who for years

had wanted nothing of royalty save that he had not actually proclaimed

himself King) presented himself for audience and bent himself

twenty-five or twenty-six times successively, and went and came back,

and went and came back, till he was so tired that he nearly fell

forward in his last genuflection, may have weighed with the keen young

observer. The man was getting old; let him go with his sins upon his

head.

So he went. And Babar with the thirty thousand retainers at _his_ back

set out promptly for Kabul.

His paternal uncle, its King, had died leaving a young son. A

perfidious minister had ousted this boy from the throne, but had

himself been assassinated at a grand festival. Thereinafter all was

disorder and tumult. Fitting opportunity then for a _coup d'etat_.

So, over the peaks and passes, Babar at the head of a movable column

passed swiftly. Still more swiftly--since surprise is the essence of

success--when news came that the usurper for the time being had left

Kabul at the head of his army to intercept another adversary. The

instant this information was received, the young leader gave his

orders; within an hour the force was on the march. A hill pass lay

before them; it must be mastered ere dawn; they must go up and up all

the night through, the laden mules stumbling over the stones,

dismounted troopers hauling their horses up rock ladders. A troublous

time, indeed; but at last the crest of the hill was reached, and

there, bright to the South, showed a star.

The young leader's heart leapt to his mouth--Could it--could it be

Canopus?--the lucky star of the conqueror? The star of which he had

read--the star he had never seen before ...

"That--that cannot be _Soheil_," he said almost timorously.

"It is _Soheil_, Most High," replied Baki Cheghaniani in a courtier's

voice; then repeated pompously the well known verse:

"How far dost thou shine, _Soheil?_

And where dost thou rise?

Who knows? But this cannot fail:

Thy light brings luck to the eyes

Who see it and cry, 'All hail!

_Soheil!_'"

"Gentlemen!" rang out Babar's jubilant young voice, cutting the

clear night air like a knife. "Let us give it all we can...! All

hail!--_Soheil!_"

"All hail! _Soheil!_" The cry clamoured round the rocks and surged up

from the ravines where men were still striving upwards; while on that

downward path to the pleasant valleys below where spear points were

already beginning to cluster, the troopers paused to echo and re-echo:

"All hail! _Soheil!_"

And Babar's star was veritably in the ascendant. Within a month--yet

once more without battle, without contest--he had gained complete

possession of Kabul and Ghazni with the countries and provinces

dependent thereon.

It had been almost unbelievable success ever since that day when on

the uplands of Ilak, he had shaved off his beard and set aside, once

and for all, his childish hopes and aims!

_Really_, it was rather quaint! The thought of it, with its hint of

imagination, its something beyond the dull routine of the inevitable,

added zest to the young King's almost rapturous appreciation of his

new dominions.

To begin with Kabul was in the very midst of the habitable world. That

was a great point in its favour. Then it was in the fourth climate;

and so of course its gardens were perfection. Its warm and its cold

districts were close together; in a single day you could go to a place

where snow never falls, and in the space of two astronomical hours you

might reach a spot where snow lay always (except now and then when the

summer happened to be peculiarly hot).

Then the fruits! Grapes, pomegranates, apricots, peaches, pears,

apples, quinces, jujubes, damsons, walnuts, almonds, to say nothing of

oranges and citrons! The wines, also, were strong and intoxicating;

indeed, that produced on the skirts of one mountain was celebrated for

its potency. This, however, was only a matter of hearsay since Babar

was still a tee-totaler; and as the verse says:

"The drinker knows the virtue of wine

Which those who are sober can't divine."

Then the honey was delicious, the number of beehives extraordinary,

and the climate itself was so extremely delightful that in this

respect there was no other such place in the known world.

But it was the gardens, after all, which made Kabul what it was, a

place that filled the imagination with joy. Years and years afterwards

the mere thought of them was to make Babar homesick almost to tears;

now every moment of time he could spare was spent on the skirts of the

Shah-Kabul hill where terraces rise one above the other to touch the

Summer Palace of the New Year. It was early October; the plane trees

were dropping their golden leaves, the peaches were crimson and pale

red, the vines vied with each other in vivid colouring. It was all so

much pure joy to the young King, and he passed on his content to all.

His dearest mother was housed as she never had been before. And when

old Isan-daulet came, just to have a peep at her grandson's success,

he lodged her in the New Year's palace where the old lady could have

her fill of the garden. Since, quaintly enough, it was from the

ancient desert-born dame that Babar inherited his keen delight in

flowers. Kasim-Beg was back too, and so was Dost-Ali, his oldest

friend amongst the nobles of Andijan; but Kambar-Ali had left; he was

a thoughtless and rude talker and the more polished courtiers of Kabul

could not put up with his manners. Not that he was a great loss, for

besides talking idly--and those who talk persistently cannot avoid at

times saying foolish things--his wits were but skin deep, and he had a

muddy brain.

There was but one fly in the honey, and that was the desire of all

Babar's female relations that he should marry. There was justice, he

felt, in his mother's claim for grandchildren. Undoubtedly it was his

duty; but ...

He was too good-natured, however, to resist making everyone as happy

as he was himself, especially after old Isan-daulet arrived with a

bride in her pocket; so, before he quite realised the magnitude of the

affair, he was duly wedded to yet another cousin, a half-sister of

dead Prince Baisanghar. She was some years older than her groom and

very, very beautiful.

But Babar came out from the bridal-chamber with a stern, set mouth and

went straight to his mother.

"Tell her to say no more of Dearest-One," he said briefly; "or there

will be trouble. And 'twere as well if she left Baisanghar in peace

also. She loved him, doubtless--but--but so did I." His voice softened

over the last words.

Trouble, however, was not to be avoided. Babar made no more

complaints; possibly because he gave few opportunities for fresh

injury.

His mother wept and scolded in vain. That hurt him; but for his

cousin-wife he cared not at all. He was proud; he could not understand

a woman's petty spite, especially when shown to _him_, a good-looking

young King in the zenith of success.

"We do not agree," he said gloomily. "Lo! it is true what Saadi saith:

'In a good man's house a cross-grained wife

Makes hell upon earth with ill-tempered strife.'

Mayhap if we part we may come together again in better fashion; and

sure I pray God that such a thing as a shrew be not left in the

world."

He would not acknowledge any fault on his side. Perhaps there was

none. Anyhow he was determined this year of good fortune should not be

marred by silly domestic squabbles. So, with affectionate farewells to

his mother, whom he left determined to bring her choice to reason, he

set off in light-hearted fashion to make that irruption into Hindustan

which he had threatened when he had marked his forehead with pollen

dust. He was not strong enough as yet, his army was not yet

sufficiently disciplined for any attempt at real conquest; but he

meant at least to cross the river Sind and set foot on Indian soil.

The expedition, however, fizzled out into a mere plundering raid along

the western bank of the Indus. But Babar at least saw India, getting

his first glimpse of it across the wide waters and sandbanks of that

great stream. He was deeply impressed by the sight. At some places the

water seemed to join the sky; at others the farther bank lay reflected

in inverted fashion like a _mirage_. And he saw other strange and

beautiful things also. Once between this water and the heavens

something of a red appearance like a crepuscule cloud was seen, which

by and by vanished, and so continued shifting till he came near.

And then with a whirr of thousands--nay! not ten thousand nor twenty

thousand wings, but of wings absolutely beyond computation and

innumerable--an immense flock of flamingoes rose into the air, and as

they flew, sometimes their red plumes showed and sometimes they were

hidden.

So, with his mind stocked with endless new ideas, for he had been

struck by astonishment--and indeed there was room for wonder in this

new world where the grass was different, the trees different, the wild

animals of a different sort, the birds of a different plumage, the

very manners of the men different--he returned in early summer to

Kabul.

But here he once more found trouble. There was an epidemic of measles

in the town and one of the first victims was his cousin-wife. He was

vaguely distressed; mostly it is to be feared because of his mother

who had nursed her daughter-in-law devotedly. Partly also from a

remembrance of his own parting wish. Yes! it was distinctly wrong to

say such ill-advised things, for if anything did happen one always

regretted one's own words. And yet one had meant nothing.

"I will marry again, motherling! I will indeed; but this time let me

choose for myself," he said consolingly as the fond woman clung to him

in mingled joy at seeing him again, and grief at the failure of her

schemes. Not that they would have come to much, likely, even had the

cousin-wife not died; for she had been a handful doubtless, all those

months.

"Lo! motherling," said her son once more, "let us forget the mistake

for a time. Thy hands are hot, thou art outwearied. Lie so among the

cushions, and I will sing to thee."

She loved to hear him sing, and even in the old Turkhoman ballads, she

did not--like old Isan-daulet--claim to have them fairly bawled. This

new soft fashion was utterly sweet. So was her son's close-shaven

chin. He had gone far from the wild Turkhoman tents; far ahead of her;

God only knew how much farther he was to go.

"Motherling! Thou art not so well to-night," he said with solicitude

as he noticed how fever-bright were her kind, worn eyes. "I will bid

the Court physician send for him of Khorasan. He will likely know all

methods; for I cannot have thee ill, my motherling."

The Khanum held him fast with her hot hands. "I care not, sonling,"

she sobbed suddenly; "so long as thou art here to the last--the

best--the bravest son--

"But I?" he said in tender raillery, though a sudden fear gripped at

his heart. "Whom have I in the wide world but thee, mother? Lo! thou

art the one thing feminine left to me after all these years." And his

eyes grew stern as he thought of that dearest Dearest-One away in far

Samarkand. Thank God she had a child.

"Have I not always said so?" wailed his mother. "Have I not bid thee

have children? Ah, Babar! if I live, promise thou wilt marry."

"I will marry either way, motherling," he said. "Lo! I promise that;

so cease thy tears and try to sleep. Thou wilt be better by morn."

But morning found the palace hushed with the hush of mortal sickness.

There was no longer any doubt that the Khanum had contracted measles

in its worst repressed form, and regret, vague almost unreasonable

regret, seized on Babar. He was responsible. It was his fault. His

mother had nursed his wife. The Khorasan physician came and ordered

water-melons; he of Kabul let blood. And Babar sat dry-eyed beside his

mother, holding her hot hand. She did not know him. Those words of

hers, begging him to marry had been her last to him. His to her his

promise that he would marry. Even amid his dazed grief he remembered

this; remembered it keenly as, when the end came in quiet

unconsciousness, he bent over her to give the last caress before Death

claimed the body and it lay soulless, impure. But she? She was

received into the Mercy of God.

He said that over and over again to himself as, on the Sunday morning,

he put his strong shoulder under the light bier and carried it to the

Garden of the New Year. It was summer-time now, the roses were

beginning to blow, the tulips were nigh over, but the wild pansies

were in full blossom. They had dug a grave under the plane trees and

here, after the committal prayers had been said and flowers strewn,

Babar, holding the head and Kasim, his foster brother, the feet, laid

the light, muslin-swathed, tinsel-bound corpse in the long, low niche,

cut coffin-wise in the side. His voice scarcely trembled at all as he

laid a handful of earth upon the breast with the solemn words of

admonition and hope.

"Out of the dust I made you, and to dust I return you, to raise you

yet once more out of the dust upon the Day of Resurrection."

But his eyes brimmed with tears as, with lavish hand, he scattered

pansy blossoms till the white shroud was hidden by them.

Then without one word he drew himself up from the grave, and taking a

shovel worked his hardest to fill in the earth.

Afterwards he sat down and looked out over the valley.

When his time came, he, also, would lie here. One could not desire a

more peaceful, a more beautiful spot. But he would have no tomb built

over him to blot out the blue sky. No! He and his mother should rest

together till the Resurrection morn out in the open, among the birds

and flowers.

CHAPTER II

I set Death's Door wide open for thee, Friend,

That thou might'st go.

I did not weep; I did not even send

One sign of woe

To follow, lest the way thou had'st to wend

The harder show.

But thou? Thou shut'st the Door upon my face,

Thou hid'st from me

One tiny gleam of glory from the place

Where thou would'st be;

In this world or the next there is no trace

No trace of thee!

With the swift family affection of their clan, relatives gathered

round Babar in his bereavement. His paternal aunts came from Khorasan,

and ere the forty days of mourning were over, a small cavalcade

arrived from Tashkend. But it brought an aggravation of grief; for old

Isan-daulet had predeceased her daughter by a few days. Babar's uncle,

the little Khan, had also died; but beyond the fact that this deepened

the Shadow-of-Death which seemed to have fallen over his young life,

it brought no sorrow to the King. It was different with his

grandmother. With her passing he had veritably no feminine thing left

to whom he owed affection and duty, to whom he could go for comfort

and counsel.

There were his paternal aunts, of course; good creatures every one of

them, especially Ak Begum, though the others always flouted her

because she had not married. Which was very unkind, since anyone

with half-an-eye could see it was because she had devoted her life to

her fat, half-witted lame sister. Poor Badul-jamal-Begum! What an

irony of fate it was that she had been called that! The "Lady of

Astonishing-Beauty." But feminine names were beyond reason. Even Ak

Begum--the "Fair Princess." What a name for that little bird-like,

dark creature who twittered and preened herself at every word.

Yet she was the only one of them who understood, who gave the young

man's sore heart any comfort at all.

She came to him, looking as if no pin were out of place, so natty,

with her scanty hair still braided in virginal fashion on her wrinkled

forehead, and said in her high piping voice:

"Lo, nephew! here are violets. A man brought them from the snows. Are

they not sweet? Sniff them! Thy mother was ever so fond of them."

And Babar sniffed at them and afterwards took them to his mother's

grave. Yes! The Fair Princess was certainly his grandfather's

daughter; of the same blood as he was.

Still, grief must have its way, and here it was unbounded. Regret and

remorse were mixed with it; and, yet once again, Babar gave way before

the mental strain.

He tried to resume his ordinary life and actually started to lead his

army afield, but was struck down with a sort of sleeping sickness. For

days no matter what efforts they made to rouse him, his eyes

constantly fell back to sleep. Yet after a time he pulled himself

together again and started once more, but this time with no definite

plan. Nor did he quite recover his normal health all that winter,

which was spent in half-hearted attacks, and whole-hearted forgiveness

of all and sundry of his enemies; for it was not his wish to treat

anyone harshly. The snow lay very deep that winter in the high glens

and passes. At one place off the road it reached up to the horses'

cruppers and the pickets appointed for the night-watch round the camp

had to remain on their horses, from sheer inability to dismount.

Half the army suffered, and Babar himself had to be carried back to

Kabul, helpless with lumbago. Mental unhappiness always seemed to

affect his bodily health. But spring comes early in Kabul and the

pulse of renewed life began to beat once more in Babar's veins. By

March, when the red tulips he had planted there were in full bloom

about his mother's grave in the garden of the New Year, he was once

more looking out from that high ground at the world beneath his feet,

and straining his bright eyes over new horizons.

One thing he must do. He must marry. But this time he would choose for

himself. This time he would give himself a chance of finding that new

world he had seen when he was a boy in Dearest-One's eyes. Poor

Dearest-One! He had had letters from her concerning their mother's

death, and their pitifulness had almost broken his heart. Yet he could

do nothing, nothing! She was as one dead; only not at peace like his

mother.

But she also had urged marriage. Yes! he must marry, and no one should

have a finger in the matrimonial pie but himself; least of all his

paternal aunts. If needs be he would marry privately. The idea

attracted him; he pondered over it. The question arose, in that case,

whom he was to choose. Amongst the well born, those who lived in the

circle of distinction as the phrase ran, it would be impossible.

Without a _confidante_ the mere broaching of marriage was out of the

question.

And yet the very idea of one low born was distasteful to him.

So, as he pondered vaguely over possibilities, an idea came to him.

What of the frightened girl? Why not?

She could not be more than a year or two his senior; if that, for

she had been much younger than his Cousin Gharib. And her father was

dead. And she lived in a House-of-Rest. That is to say if she still

lived--or if she was not married.

Bah!--he was a fool to let his fancy run so far. Still he could

enquire when he went to Khorasan as he meant to do some time that

summer. Meanwhile a feeling of content came to him; partly because his

imagination endorsed the idea as delightfully sentimental; mostly

because it postponed necessity for immediate action.

And yet, when a day or two after a missive arrived from his uncle,

Sultan Hussain, begging for his assistance at Khorasan against the

arch enemy and raider Shaibani-Khan who threatened an inroad, Babar

felt pleased at what seemed an order from Fate; especially as the

missive came by the hands of rather a quaint ambassador; namely by the

son of his uncle's professional Dreamer-of-Dreams. To be sure Cousin

Gharib had made fun of the man's pretensions; but there was more in

that sort of thing than could be accounted for by reason. Anyhow, it

was a clear duty to set off at once. If Shaibani was the enemy, then,

if other princes went to the attack on their feet it was incumbent on

him to go if necessary on his head! and if they went against him with

swords, it was his business to go, were it only with stones!

"The Most High must have a care of Kabul nathless," said wary old

Kasim. "Look you the saying runs:

Ten dervishes in one rug

Lie comfy, and warm, and snug,

But two Kings upon one throne--

Such a thing never was known.

The most High's brother--and his cousin--"

But Babar cut him short. He never would listen to suspicions of his

own relations.

"I have done nothing," he said, with just that little touch of

conscious virtue that in him was so translucent, so simple, though in

one less artless it might have been offensive, "to provoke either of

them to hostility; neither have they given me ground for

dissatisfaction."

Kasim shrugged his shoulders and muttered under his breath that it

would need the Day of Judgment to make some folk believe in sin, and

applied himself to seeing that the garrison left was sufficient to

keep order.

Babar himself was full of spirits. Apart from other considerations the

prospect of, at last, seeing Herat, the most civilised city in Central

Asia, filled him with keen interest. It was full, he knew, of poets,

painters, philosophers, and its luxuries were things to speak of with

bated breath. In addition, he had a pleasant remembrance of his Uncle

Hussain. It was more than ten years since he had seen him over in the

camp which had struck him, the hardy barbarian, with awe. Did the old

man--old now with a vengeance since he had reigned a good fifty

years--still keep butting rams and amuse himself with cock fighting?

Above all, did he still on festival days put on that small turban tied

in three folds, broad and showy, and having placed a plume nodding

over it in that style go to prayers? Babar wrote in his own hand--in

the Babari writing which he had just invented and of which he was

vastly proud--a letter to the kindly old man, telling him that he had

set out from Kabul and hoped to be with him shortly. This he entrusted

to an ambassador who with the Dreamer-of-Dreams started express for

Herat; he himself having a small job on hand by the way, in the

punishment of some wandering tribes to the west.

It was not much of a task; but summer quarters in the hills had a

fascination for Babar, and he remained on the top of one of the many

ranges he had to cross; despatching Kasim-Beg meanwhile with a body of

troops to scour the countryside for rebels.

There was a sense of freedom about the wide upland stretches of sweet

grass, where flocks and herds grazed placidly, where flowers blossomed

by the million, and the tall fir forests edged the downward slopes.

The whole world of blue waving hills touched the blue sky. One might

be adrift on a huge raft in the River of Life. Babar would doff shoes

and wander barefoot for hours, content with a chance shot after an

escaping deer, or a chance following of his own vagrant thoughts. And

these often fled in the direction of a House-of-Rest wherein dwelt a

frightened girl. He could not help it. He was made sentimental to his

heart's core. Remove the pressure of fine fighting, of ardent

ambition, and there he was, ready to be touched by pity, love,

admiration. And the thought of the woman to come was a perpetual

stimulus to his imagination. The mere fact that he did not know her

name was delightful; it took from the idea all trace of earth. And

Babar, though the very reverse of ascetic in his tastes and pleasures,

had ever been repulsed by sensuality. His was the Epicurean enjoyment

of the spirit, as distinct from that of the mind, or that of the body.

So in his thoughts he called the woman he intended should be his wife

"My moon," which is the eastern equivalent of "My queen"; and, in easy

dilettante fashion wrote more than one ode to that luminary. Most of

them were in Persian and contained exactly the proper number of feet,

and rang the appointed interchanges of meaning and words with

faultless accuracy. He was quite proud of them, and thought better of

them than of the one in Turkhi; which, however, he set to music and

sang, for his innate good taste was for ever breaking loose from

scholastic tradition. He twanged the tune on a _cithara_ as he sat on

a rock in the moonlight and felt quite light-hearted over his own

unworthiness; it fitted so neatly into the rhyming fall ...

Moon of still night!

Whence the bright light

that enfolds

In its pure smile

Earth's untold guile;

that upholds

Silver in glow,

whiter than snow,

this my hand

Tuning thy praise?

Whence come thy rays?

From what land

Bringest thou peace,

thus to release,

from its sin

Stricken sad heart,

wailing its part

in Life's din?

Lo! from God's sun

must thou have won

thy kind light.

Though I am clay,

watch me alway

through the night.

I am of earth;

thine is the birth-

right divine.

Moon of my soul,

thine is this whole

heart of mine.

The distance from Kabul to Khorasan was over eight hundred miles; so

with even every-day marching the journey would have taken some time,

and Babar was in no particular hurry. Less so than ever when news came

to him with the return of his ambassador, that Sultan Hussain had

suddenly died from an apoplectic seizure. At first Babar felt inclined

to turn back. His uncle, he knew, had left his kingdom, in unheard of

fashion, to his three legitimate sons, in defiance of the old saw

about the ten dervishes, and Babar had too much experience to believe

that such an arrangement could work satisfactorily. However he had

other motives for advancing, and therefore he continued his route,

and, passing over the last range of high hills, found himself in the

country where the advanced detachments of the Usbek force were already

raiding. This in itself was an attraction, bringing as it did a chance

of fine fighting. He found his cousins, the new Kings, encamped, ready

to meet the advancing foe on the Murghab river; or rather he found two

of them. The third, from private motives of pique had refused to join

the confederacy. This appeared to Babar to be inexpressibly mean, when

everyone else had united and were sparing no efforts to oppose an

enemy so formidable as Shaibani. He could not understand how any

reasonable man could pursue a line of conduct which must after his

death, stain his fair fame. Surely everyone with the commonest grace

would push forwards his career, so that, even if closed, it would

conduct him to renown and glory, since fame is truly a second

existence?

These sentiments, however, fine as they were, did not make much mark

on the luxurious camp on the banks of the Murghab. His cousins

received Babar fairly well, though their manners required some

polishing up by old Kasim-Beg's inflexible rules of etiquette. Of

course, the fact that two of the younger and illegitimate princes did

not come out as far as they ought to have done to welcome their Kingly

cousin was objectionable; but that might be put down to delay in

starting due to an over-night debauch, rather than to intentional

slight. But when it came to the State reception in the Audience Tent,

Kasim had to pluck at his young master's girdle and remind him with

this jog, that he was to go no further, but to await his eldest

cousin's advance. Which he did obediently, knowing that old Kasim held

his King's honour as his own, and was keenly alive to his consequence.

But he, himself, was always forgetting these _convenances_, where he

was concerned. If you really felt affectionate it was a nuisance

having to wait, and bow, and scrape.

The State reception, however, went off very well and it was followed

by a sort of entertainment at which wine was served in goblets of

silver and gold, that were put down by the meat!

Fateful innovation which sent old Kasim back to his own camp hungry,

in the highest of dudgeons.

"Had it been a drinking party, sire," he protested, "'twould have been

my own fault for being there. But at an official dinner, 'twas

scandalous. No faithful Mussulman could touch a morsel of food so

defiled."

Babar, somewhat regretful at a rather abrupt departure, murmured an

excuse to the effect briefly, of "_autres tempes, autres moeurs_";

whereat Kasim-Beg, a purist for the old ways, broke out hotly:

"Lo! sire! the Institutions of Ghengis Khan have brought your

Highness' family well through much trouble. Sacredly have they

observed them in their parties, their courts, their festivals, their

entertainments, their down sittings, their risings up, and it would

ill become their descendant to flout them."

Babar flushed up; in his heart of hearts, he was not quite such an

admirer of the old Turk. "Lo! the Institutes are good enough," he

said; "a man may well follow them; yet are they not of Divine

authority, so that one be damned for disobeying them. Besides, see

you, what hope would there be for the world if folk made no change? If

a father has done wrong why should not a son change it to what is

right?"

Old Kasim, munching away at the dry bread and pickles which was all

his servants could produce, snorted. "'Tis the other way round most

times; and see you, sire, I give those Kings your cousins one year,

one little year, to hold Herat! Then the Kingdom of their father--God

rest his soul since he had gleams of grace and once let one of his

God-forgetting sons go before the magistrate--held--despite wine

bibbing--for nigh fifty years, will have gone for ever."

"Aye," replied Barbar, thoughtfully. "I have noticed that myself. Some

men drink with impunity. I wonder if 'twould hurt me?"

"God forbid! your Majesty!" said old Kasim with a tremble in his

voice. "Shall all our care, mine and the saintly Kwaja who held you as

a boy in his guardian care, be wasted? God forbid, say I."

But Babar said nothing; he knew that in his inmost heart he had had

for years a great longing just to see what it was like to be drunk! It

could scarcely hurt for once, and the land of inebriety could hardly

be the arid desert it had been painted for him, or so many folk would

not wander in it.

He was always open to reason on all points. Nevertheless he gave out

solemnly that he drank no wine, and his cousins, being good hosts,

refrained from pressing him to do so.

Badia-zaman, the elder of the three, doubtless thought little of him

for the abstinence. To be young, good-looking, able to enjoy yourself

in every way and yet not to take the best of Life, seemed to him sheer

foolishness; and he showed his estimate in his manner, so that Babar

came home from his second interview in a fume of anger.

"This shall not be!" he said hotly. "Kasim! send proper

representations that young as I am, I am of high extraction. Twice

have I by force regained my paternal Kingdom, Samarkand. To show want

of respect to one who has done so much for his family by repelling the

foreign invader is not commendable."

For a marvel the young King was on his dignity, much to old Kasim's

joy. And with good result; for nothing more could have been desired at

the next audience which Babar attended with his full retinue. And a

fine figure he looked, dressed in the very latest fashion with a gold

brocade coat, a flowered undershirt and white silk baggy trousers all

lined with gold thread. His hair, too, was scented and curled and his

turban tied with a difference. A very different person this from the

ragged, out-at-elbow fugitive, or even the stern young soldier in his

tarnished coat of mail, fighting for life against overwhelming odds.

He rather liked the change. It was a new experience to ruffle with

gilded youth, and he ruffled fairly until his boon companions began to

play indecent and scurvy tricks, when he left, disgusted for the time

being. But the entertainments were wonderfully elegant. There was

every sort of delicacy on the comestible trays, and _kababs_ of fowl

and goose; indeed dishes of every sort and kind. The Prince-Kings vied

with each other in the refinement of their luxuries, and certainly

Badia-zaman's parties deserved to be celebrated; they were so fine, so

easy, so unconstrained. On the other hand Mozuffar's entertainments

were more amusing, especially when the wine began to take effect.

There was a man who danced excessively well; a dance of his own

invention.

"Dance or no dance," grumbled old Kasim, "the Princes thy cousins have

taken four months to reach this place. And now news comes that a

plundering party of Usbeks is well within touch not more than forty

miles off--and they dance! 'Twill be to another tune ere long."

"Mayhap they would let me go," said Babar eagerly, "'twould be a

diversion."

So he was off to lay his proposition before his Cousins; but they,

afraid of their own reputations, would not suffer him to move. The

fact was, as he admitted to old Kasim privately, the Princes, though

very accomplished at the social board or in the arrangements for a

party of pleasure, and though they had a pleasing talent for

conversation and society, yet possessed no knowledge whatever of the

conduct of a campaign, and were perfect strangers to the arrangements

for a battle, or the danger and spirit of a soldier's life.

This left nothing more to be said; especially as his hearer agreed

with every word.

Early autumn, however, had passed, and Shaibani, being a careful

general, prepared to withdraw his forces against the winter's

cold. This being so, there was no longer any reason--there had been

but little before--for remaining in camp at the Murghab, and the

Prince-Kings proposed a return to Herat and invited Babar to accompany

them.

"Were I your Highness," said old Kasim sturdily, "I would not go. So

far God in His mercy has kept virtue on the lips of the King, and kept

wine away from them. But in that God-forsaken city of Herat who knows

what might happen? They tell me even the women there are castaway, and

that your uncle the late King's widow drinks like a fish--may God

reward her!"

"I have never seen a woman drink wine," said Babar quite thoughtfully.

"Have you?"

Kasim looked at his young master critically.

"New things are not always good things, sire," he replied drily, "and,

as was mentioned ere we set out from Kabul, God only knows what may

happen there if we delay our return too long. Already have five months

passed and 'tis a fifty days' march homewards."

"Not if we take the high road," said Babar.

"The high road," echoed the old general; "that may be covered with

snow any moment now."

"Yet will I chance my luck," returned Babar gaily. "See you, old

friend, I have my reasons! I must see Herat--in the whole habitable

world they say there is not such a city; besides ..."

He paused, for his was a truthful soul even to itself; and he knew

that the past six weeks of jollity and convivial male merry-making had

considerably dimmed his desire to do his duty and marry. Still he had

promised himself he would try and seek out his Cousin Gharib's

betrothed--for she had never been his wife--and he meant to do it.

Between whiles of course. For he must make the most of his time in

Herat. Yes! it would be a pity to miss the chance of his life. To be

in the most refined of cities which possessed every means of

heightening pleasure and gaiety; in which all the incentives to, and

apparatus for, enjoyment were combined into one vast invitation to

indulgence, and _not_ to indulge, would be foolish. If he did not

seize the present moment, even to the point of tasting wine, he was

not likely to have such another.

And, certainly, wine seemed to raise the level of a man's mind. His

cousins were but dullards out of their cups. And there was no need to

exceed. To be dead-drunk was no pleasure to anyone.

CHAPTER III

The Load of Love, nor Earth nor Heav'n can bear,

Yet thou, Improvident! wouldst lightly wear

The lovers' yoke, give up the flaming sword,

Fool! Love only can bear love! Beware! Beware!

_Ebd-ul-Homid_.

Herat was entered. It was his!

Babar, his eyes wide with curiosity and appreciation had ridden

through what were to him interminable streets. He had seen towers and

pleasure houses and palaces rising on all sides, had noted the crowds

which surged out from every side alley to see one who was already

renowned in the songs of half Central Asia, as the embodiment of

youthful valour. And all had been simply inconceivable in its beauty,

its size.

Yusuf-Ali who had been appointed his guide, rode at his right hand,

and supplied him with endless information. Close on a million of

people in the town and suburbs. Over a hundred and seventy thousand

occupied houses. Nigh on four hundred public schools.

Shops! Why there must be at least fifteen thousand of them!

The statistics went in at one ear and out at another. It was the sheer

beauty of the place which held Babar's mind. The wide valley, the

surrounding hills just touched with snow. The white buildings

following the blue curves of the river. The marble colonnades

terracing the slopes, the marble palaces crowning the heights; and,

dense-packed between high carven houses, the multi-coloured crowd all

intent on pleasure. Roars of laughter rising from it at every passing

jest, a chorus of "Victory, young champion!" following him as he rode

along.

By God and his prophet! Life was a splendid thing to live!

Had he had Prince Fortunatus' purse in his pocket he would have flung

gold pieces along every inch of the way.

Even in the mausoleum of his lately deceased uncle, where, in

accordance with etiquette he had, before even taking up his quarters

in the palace assigned to him, to pay his respects to the female

members of his uncle's family, his ceremonial condolences were

somewhat marred by the _joie de vivre_ which simply exhaled from

him. Yet he was none the less sympathetically impressed by the dim

Dome-of-Kings all lit up darkly by swinging lamps, by tall funereal

tapers throwing flickering shadows on the purple-crimson pall fringed

with gold that covered the catafalque.

Dim blue clouds of incense filled the air; their scent mixed with the

perfume-sodden rustle of the silks and satins beneath the circle of

ivory-tinted mourning veils that enshrouded the crouching figures of

the female mourners. The low guttural chant of canons appointed to

sing prayers for the repose of the dead, rose monotonously, a fitting

background to the little conventional sobs and cries, as each lady in

turn stood up to embrace the newly arrived member of the family.

There were so many aunts to embrace; but Babar went through them

decorously; with a little real emotion when he hugged Aunt Fair, and

some rather obvious impatience when fat, silly, Astonishing

Beauty--who loved young men--hugged him.

They did not, however, keep up the "_marsiah_" for long; the

ladies--who after the expiry of five months had got over the first

flush of grief--being anxious to have their handsome relative's budget

of news.

So they all repaired to Khadijah-Begum's house and had a repast. It

was very refined and--rather to Babar's disappointment, for he was

curious to see a woman drink wine--strictly teetotal; doubtless

because Payanda-Begum, the late King's chief wife and--as his father's

sister--Babar's real aunt, was present. And she was naturally of the

highest circle of distinction and of the most correct behaviour.

Khadijah-Begum on the other hand, whom Babar now saw for the first

time, showed her low birth despite the fact that as favourite wife she

had managed the court for years. Even the knowledge that she was

Cousin Gharib's mother could not prevent Babar's putting her down at

once as a vulgar talkative woman who posed for being a person of

profound sense.

There was another Begum of the late King's present, however, on whom

the young observer, seeing her for the first time, passed a very

different opinion. This was one Lady Apak, a delicate fair woman who

spent her childless life in nursing other people's children, and who

Babar felt deserved all the respect and kindness it was in his power

to give.

He was not sorry however, when, various other visits paid, he

found himself in the house assigned to him. And sure, no better

place could have been discovered in the whole habitable world! For it

was the garden palace which the great Master-of-all-Arts, Messer

Ali-Shir--dead this while back, God rest his soul!--had designed and

built for himself. Babar spent hours wandering through its cool

corridors, sitting awhile in cunning alcoves whence the enchanting

view, framed in gilt filigree arch, showed like a picture indeed. He

sampled the rose-water baths, all mosaicked like a garden with buds,

and leaves, and blossoms; he sat stroking the soft silk pile of

carpets, green and set with flowers as thick as Andijan meadows in

spring. And there was one, deeply darkly verdant and almost covered

with the softest, fleeciest white furry blobs, on which he could have

lain down and cried, so keenly did it bring back the mantle of clover

lambskin into which he had poured the first grief that had come to his

young life.

He read round the walls of the central marble hall, veined and

mosaicked with precious stones, the boast that in after years one of

his descendants was to use in the Court-of-Private-Audience at Delhi.

"If Earth holds a Paradise--it is this, it is this, it is this."

Yes! it was true! Not only in the hall, but in every niche and

corner--in the ivory carven bedstead, in the crystal goblets inlaid

with coral, in the curiously beaten metal-work, in the very shading of

the coloured tiles, here was perfection of Beauty. Even with their

shoes doffed in respectful Oriental fashion, Babar could hardly endure

to see servants, whose minds he knew were not attuned to that high

level, passing backwards and forwards in what he felt to be a Shrine.

He dismissed them all and sat, pillowed by the softest down, looking

out from the colonnade which gave on the garden. It, also, must be

beautiful beyond compare. He would see that to-morrow. To-night it was

sufficient to revel in the burnished dusk of the orange trees, seen in

the soft moonlight, to watch the glittering radiance of the fountain

drops against that background of distant hills--purple--aye!

positively purple even in this light. Lo! it was beauty concentrated

almost to pain. Beauty, unearthly, beyond the senses. Something not to

be seen, or heard, or tasted, or touched, or even felt. Beauty that

brought an utter abnegation of Self.

"This slave has a letter for the Most High," came a clear sweet

voice. "It is from his Cousin Gharib. It was to be given--if occasion

came--in private, and in person if possible. So I have brought it."

Babar turned quickly. At first to see nothing. Then several paces away

faintly outlined against one of the square white pilasters he caught

the silhouette of a white, curiously shadowless figure. A woman's

figure surely; slim, elegant, despite the enshrouding veil.

He rose swiftly; his heart beating. His dead cousin! Could it be--No!

Impossible--And yet--

"With deepest reverence--mother," he said almost mechanically, as the

figure remaining quiescent he stepped forward to take what it held

out. He could see the hand--a marble hand in the moonlight--beyond the

line of the pilaster.

A pretty hand too, with fingers pointed and delicate.

"May God reward you," came his mechanical thanks, as instinctively he

stepped back again.

The figure remained quiescent, silent. In the moonlight he could see

clearly the sweeping black curves of the writing. The letter was very

brief.

"_Shouldst thou, cousin, ever come to Khorasan, I have counselled her,

who was my wife in name, to give you this. I make no claim, I express

no wish save this--I should like her to be happy, for I have loved

her--and thou also, O Babar. Farewell! May the Crystal Bowl give Love,

not Tears_."

For an instant Babar stood confounded, irresolute: it was so

unconventional: so almost impossible. Yet it fitted strangely with the

place; with his vague feeling that had been beyond even Time and

Space.

[Illustration: "'THIS SLAVE HAS A LETTER FOR THE MOST HIGH'"]

There was a ruby jewelled lamp swinging from the arch between them. It

scarce gave light, but it sent a patterned shimmering rose upon the

white marble floor. A gentle breeze swayed the lamp; the rose

flickered between them backwards and forwards. His eyes were on it as

he stood holding the letter, the moonlight catching at the signet ring

he wore, dallying with the gold embroidery of his light silken coat.

"Is it possible," he said at last, fluttering a bit like a girl, "that

she who stands before me--"

"Yea, I am she," came the composed reply.

It settled the young man by bringing conviction of his own confusion.

"But how--" he began, a certain blame in his surprise; and once again

the answer was ready, grave, sufficient.

"My lord's slave comes every Friday after the custom of her

family--she is of the blood of the divine Jami as doubtless my lord

knows--to place flowers on the tomb of the now sainted Messer

Ali-Shir--may his ashes rest in peace--who is interred by his own wish

in this garden, and who was her distant relative. But in life he was

ever kind to this dust-like one, teaching her, and allowing her to be

his disciple. So her litter comes hither often. It awaits her return

yonder at the grave. Thus the letter was easy to deliver in person,

and it is delivered. May God keep the King."

Faintly the figure moved as if to go; but Babar stepped a step

forward. His head was in a whirl, his heart curiously steady.

"And has the cupola of chastity no word to say of herself?" he asked.

"What word is there to say, my lord?" came the quick reply. "I have

performed my duty. The rest lies with my lord."

There was just a suspicion of raillery in the voice which spurred

Babar to hardihood.

"Then I would fain know if--if she who thus deigns to honour me is

satisfied with--with what she sees?"

"But yea! my lord, quite satisfied! And this is not the first time she

has seen my lord. She was at the window when he made his entry to the

town."

"Then the lady has doubly the advantage," said Babar with an

irrepressible laugh. "Yet will I not ask her to make us equal and

unveil. That were not meet at such a time and place."

There was just that faint suspicion of conscious virtue about the

remark, but it was met promptly, coolly.

"Nor is there need. My lord would not be frightened at what he saw, as

I, poor foolish child, was frightened. But I lived to be wiser. I

lived to know that deformity of body is as naught before deformity of

mind. But my lord has neither. Nor has this dust-like one. She is

counted beautiful, and though she catalogues not her own charms, she

hath two eyes, somewhat large, that look straight, a passable nose,

thirty-two sound teeth, even and white, and a mouth that can say kind

things harshly, and--an' it please my lord--harsh things kindly. Shall

the recital proceed further, my lord?"

"By God and the prophets no!" cried Babar catching fire at last.

"There is but one more thing between us. Lady, wilt thou take me for

husband?"

"Of a surety; therefore came I here." So far the reply was as ever,

cool, collected, without shadow of emotion; now the sweet, polished

voice broke faintly. "There is but one matter of which I would remind

my lord. I am older than he by three years. And I am not quite like

other women. Messer Ali-Shir taught me much. If my lord would rather

someone else--"

The rose light on the pavement flickered between them backwards and

forwards.

"Lady," said Babar, and involuntarily he drew himself up to his full

height, "in my childhood they married me to one for whom I cared

little. She left me, saying truly, I did not love her. Awhile back my

mother--God rest her soul for she was very dear to me--married me to

yet another wife whom, mercifully, God took; since we were as cat and

dog. But I have never loved a woman. I do not now; perhaps I never

shall. 'Tis well to be prepared."

Was it a faint sigh, or only another breath of wind that set the

swinging lamp swaying.

"I am prepared. And God may send the father's love to the mother of

his son."

There was silence. The splash of the glistening fountain made itself

heard faintly; the soft coo of a dove in the orange trees seemed a

lullaby to the whole wide world.

"Lady," said Babar when he spoke at last, "I have sworn to myself that

none should know of my marriage till it was accomplished. Till I could

place my wife before them and say 'See her whom I have chosen.' I stay

but a week or two in Herat. My kingdom calls me back. Is it possible

that ere I go the formulas may be said privately, so that when good

fortune enables me to send to Herat it may be for my wedded wife that

I send?"

There was a pause Then the cool, quiet voice replied, "Wherefore not,

my lord? I have said I am ready."

"But when?" Babar spoke anxiously, almost appealingly. He felt himself

as wax in a woman's hand--a woman he had never seen.

"Next Friday, my lord, when I come again to lay the flowers at the

shrine. If my lord makes preparation, and if he changeth not his mind,

his servant will be there."

"Unless she also changeth her mind," interrupted Babar with forced

lightness.

"That might be," came the answer. "Yet is it not so likely as the

other. The caged bird does not choose its song. And now farewell. God

have you in his keeping."

The figure stooped to gather its flowing robes together, and something

in the supple elegance of the movement sent Babar's blood to his heart

and head.

"Not so, my moon," he cried, every atom of him vibrant with emotion.

"Not so do we part." And with two swinging strides he was across the

flickering rose light on the marble floor, took the hand held out to

him unflinchingly, and stooped to kiss it.

"Wife and mother, guardian and friend, so shalt thou be to me, so help

me God."

The next instant he was alone staring into the night, wondering if he

had fallen asleep and dreamt it all.

No! It was a reality. His signet ring was gone. He must have put it on

that firm delicate hand, the memory of whose touch thrilled him

through and through.

And he had called her his moon. Yet his heart was beating tranquilly.

When he lay down on the carven bed he did not toss and turn. He did

not even feel inclined to indite a sonnet to his mistress's eyebrow or

compare her to anything in heaven above or the earth beneath.

He was simply content, and fell into a dreamless sleep. It was not

till the next morning that he recollected that he did not know the

lady's name, nor where she lived.

Not that either ignorance mattered. He would find out next Friday.

CHAPTER IV

Noisy the Tavern where Life's wine has sped

From variant cup to fuddle variant Head;

Love peeps through crannied Door; each Drinker straight

Flings cup aside to follow Her instead.

_Ebd-ul-Hamid_.

There was not much time for thought in Herat. Early in the morning

Babar was astir to ride out with Yusuf to some of the sights, and find

the first collation of the day spread in some suitable place.

Then on his return there was the State visit to the Court, where with

pomp and circumstance he took his place as King of Kabul.

After that, each day had its entertainment at some new palace of

delight, and sometimes after dinner had been served, the party would

be carried off by one of the guests to a further and more intimate

circle of amusement.

Once this was done by no less a person than Khadijah-Begum herself.

She took a few of the young princes to the King's Pleasure House, a

delightful little edifice of two storeys high which stood in the midst

of a still more delightful garden. The upper storey was simply

perfect! Four little apartments at the four corners, each with a wide

balcony, and between them and enclosed by them, one large central

arched Hall. Every portion of this upper storey was covered with

frescoes representing the battles of Babar's grandfather Sultan

Abusa'id.

And it was all so charmingly arranged. Carpets and hangings

everywhere; especially in the balcony where the party assembled and

where Babar as the guest of the evening was placed above his hosts.

These little attentions always flattered Babar and he never failed to

notice them. So the entertainment began with a cup of welcome which

was charged and drunk by the host in chief. Then the cupbearers began

to fill up the cup of the others with pure wine which everyone,

including Khadijah-Begum, quaffed as if it had been the water of life!

Only the tall good-looking young King refused, even when, the party

waxing warm, and the spirit mounting to their heads, they took a fancy

to make the young abstainer drink also.

The night was fine, the moonlight streamed in upon fruit and flowers.

Jelal the flute player fluted to perfection, and Bechab on the harp

might have wiled doves from their nests. Then Hafiz sang well in the

Herati style, low, delicate, equable. Everything tempted to pleasure

and Babar sat with a half-frown on his kindly face watching the others

get lordily drunk.

Then mercifully a false note was struck by one of his own following.

Jahangir Mirza, who was far gone, insisted that his favourite singer

of Samarkand should delight the company. And the man sang (as he

always did) in a loud harsh voice and out of tune; altogether a

dreadful, disagreeable performance. So disagreeable that the Khorasan

Princes, though far too polite to stop it out of respect to Babar, had

to yawn and furtively protect their ears. This, and the reflection

that if he was to yield and taste wine it would be more courteous to

do so when he was the guest of the eldest of the Princes, and not of

the younger, decided him not to give way; at that party at any rate.

But he was no wet blanket; for after a time, having had enough of the

Pleasure-House, they repaired to the new Winter-Palace, where Yusuf,

being by this time extremely drunk, rose and, for a marvel, danced

remarkably well; possibly because he was a musical man. Here they all

got very merry and friendly. Babar was presented more or less

ceremoniously with a corselet, a sword, a belt, and a whitish Tipchak

horse, and someone sang a Turkhi song well. On the other hand while

the party was hot with wine two slaves again performed indecent scurvy

tricks. But this time Babar did not leave. He remained to the bitter

end when the party broke up at such an untimely hour that Babar

thought it best to stay where he was; the others doubtless, being too

drunk to move.

Perhaps it was this experience, coming in such close contrast to the

marvellous peace of that moonlight night when, as if in a dream, he

had handfasted a nameless woman, that made Babar listen to old Kasim's

horror-struck remonstrances concerning his young master's failing

adherence to orthodoxy in the matter of wine.

The rigid old Mahomedan was fairly scandalised, and made such a fuss

that the Khorasan Prime-Minister intervened, and took _his_ young

masters to task so severely that they wholly laid aside any idea of

urging their cousin further to drink.

Rather perhaps to that cousin's private regret. It seemed a thousand

pities to leave Herat without having tasted all Life's pleasures; all,

that is, that were not indecent or scurvy. And a man could be drunk

and yet remain a gentleman.

Still, when the elder prince did give the promised party, at which

Babar had promised himself he would for once drink wine, he still

refrained, though he fretted because his nobles thought it necessary

only to drink by stealth, hiding their goblets and taking draughts in

great dread. It was so foolish; when they knew he was never one to

object to the following of common usage, if so be the follower could

reconcile it to his own conscience.

He was altogether a trifle hoity-toity at this supper party; for a

whole goose, after Herati fashion, being set down before him, he did

not touch it; and, on his host's asking if he did not like it, said

frankly, that being accustomed to the unrefined habit of having his

food served in gobbets, he did not know how to carve it.

Whereupon his host obligingly sent for the goose, cut it up, and

placed it himself before his guest. Badia-zaman was, of course,

unequalled in such attentions, and life was very delightful; yet still

Babar's thoughts began to turn to the next Friday, and after that to

Kabul. His future life seemed more settled than it had ever been

before.

But Fate had a surprise in store for him, as he found out one

afternoon, when, after his usual kindly custom, he had gone to pay a

duty visit to his paternal aunts. Running down the narrow stairs which

led to Payanda-Begum's upper storey, he came full tilt on two veiled

women coming up. The stair was but shoulder wide; no room to pass,

even had the first figure not been so appallingly stout. Impossible to

pass, rude to turn one's back on those who were evidently of the

circle of distinction--

Nor could he, King of Kabul, retreat step by step like a lackey. He

stood for a second gracious, debonnair; then with a merry "Your

pardon, mother," wedged his arms tight between those narrow walls, so

swung himself back. And there, in two such bounds, he was up the six

steps and at the top of the stair.

"Have a care, nephew," shrieked a fat, familiar voice from the first

bundle. "Thou wilt fall and crush thy Yenkam!"

"My bridesmaid!" cried Babar joyously, repeating the pet nickname.

"Say not so! When didst thou come?" And he was down the stairs again

to embrace a favourite aunt he had not seen for years, and help her

mount the remaining steps.

So, still panting, the elderly matron unwound her veil and stood

revealed; fat indeed.

"Lo! Yenkam," said Babar, his eyes twinkling. "Had I fallen, I should

have fallen--soft."

"Fie on thee, scapegrace! God send thee not a skinny old age,"

retorted Habee-ba-Begum good humouredly. "But what of thy cousin

Ma'asuma here? Ma'asuma that is like the fairy princess, weighing but

five flowers--have a care of thy veil, child!"

The tiny little figure, slim and graceful, which now stood beside the

fat one, apparently made a court salutation beneath her thick veil,

and a bird-like voice said, with a laugh in every tone, "My cousin

Babar, never having seen my smallness, Mother, cannot gauge it."

The young King returned the salute in his best manner. "If the

gracious lady would allow me to judge," he began, when his Yenkam cut

short his hardihood.

"Fie! no nonsense, children! Ma'asuma! Follow me. Thou must be

presented at once to thy eldest aunt. I shall see thee, scapegrace!

doubtless, later on."

So, with a nod to Babar, bundled propriety moved off down the

corridor.

Was it chance?--Was it really a trip over a tiresome veil...?

Anyhow Habee-ba-Begum had rounded a corner, and those two young things

stood staring at each other as if they had never seen anything in the

wide world before.

It was a real case of love at first sight.

As for him, he did not even realise what she was like. He only knew

that she was beautiful exceedingly. And she knew he was a Prince

indeed.

The mirth in their eyes died down. Then hers grew startled, his caught

fire. So they stood; till suddenly hers flamed back into his, and with

a low cry she huddled her draperies round her, turned, and fled after

her mother.

Babar stood still as a stone. What had happened to him? He felt

confused, lost, yet utterly, entirely, absurdly happy.

After a time he walked soberly downstairs feeling vaguely that the

world was a new world, and that he must go and find himself.

Once in the street he went on walking blindly, on and on, till he

found himself in desert places outside the town. Then, aimlessly, he

turned back and walked as he had come, wandering through the city as

though in search of mansions and gardens.

Yet all the while he felt as if he could neither sit nor go, neither

stand nor walk.

He was literally obsessed by a passion, pure in its very intensity; a

passion which at one and the same time made him long to be with its

object, yet covered him with shame and confusion at the mere thought

of her beauty.

He returned after long hours to Ali-Shir's palace, worn out in body,

but yet more restless in mind. He had decided that this must be

love--love at long last. In that case he must write verses, and began

to catalogue the beauty of the face he had seen.

He remembered, now, that they were unusual; for little Cousin Ma'asuma

had the rare distinction of fairish hair and blue eyes. A little

flowerful face, merry, sparkling; rebellious curling hair flecked with

red gold--a tint of rose and creamy _champak_--

All this he remembered dreamily as he laboured to fit together the

fine mosaic of a Persian love ode.

"Impassioned loved one! fairest of the fair,

The waving tendrils of thy bronze gold hair

Spread round thy face each one a separate snare;

Thine eyes are vi'lets, centred by black bees

Who seek to drain their sweetness to the lees;

Thine eyebrows arch--"

He got so far as this, then threw away his pen in disgust.

Anyone could write that sort of stuff. He had read pages of it in

books: had sung such rhymes by the score. But that sort of thing had

nothing to do with his great love for Ma'asuma and hers for him.

For she had loved him, of course. The reverse was incredible, absurd.

He turned round and buried his face in the downy cushions that had, as

usual, been spread for him in his favourite corner of the colonnade.

He had had no dinner. He did not want any. He had refused his cousin's

invitations with some excuse. He forgot what--it did not matter.

Nothing in the wide world mattered but his love for Ma'asuma and hers

for him.

The moon was still bright. Not quite so bright as it had been that

night, five days ago, when he had promised to marry someone else.

Babar sat up, leant his head on his hand and began to consider how

matters stood. Oriental in mind, marriage was to him by no means

synonymous with love. He could legitimately have four wives at a time.

If he liked. But honestly he felt he would rather not. Still--as

nothing possibly could prevent his making Ma'asuma his wife--if the

other nameless lady wanted to be his wife also, he would acquiesce. He

would not go back from his promise. Only--what a pity he had called

her his "Moon"! That name belonged to his love by right.

So, as he sat dreaming, a voice said with the nasal twang of the

common folk--

"A letter for the Presence."

The coincidence of time and place startled him. He looked up

half-expectant of that tall, slim, female figure. But this was a lad

in the uniform of the Palace servants. A message mayhap from one of

the Begums. He took it carelessly from an awkward brown hand and

opened its seal.

A scent of fresh violets came to him as he did so.

And the letter?

It was written in the finest Babari hand--the hand he had

invented!--with a delicacy, an accuracy at which even the inventor of

it marvelled, and it contained but a quatrain; but such a quatrain!

Babar's scholastic appreciation of the form forced its way through his

emotional delight at the words. Ali-Shir himself could not have

written anything neater, more absolutely correct in prosody. And in

such difficult metre too, with its enlay of rhymes.

"My heart has part in this thy smart.

Dear heart! have part in this my smart!

Our sighs do rise twin to the skies;

Thy heart, my heart, are not apart."

And it was signed:

"Thy true friend Ma'asuma."

Yea! That was worth writing! That told the tale. Babar sprang to his

feet. The whole world seemed filled with radiance. He and Ma'asuma

were the only people in it.

But what should he answer? What should he write? Nothing but the

truth--God's truth.

"I love thee. I love thee, Ma'asuma. I love thee."

In his haste, his brimming emotion, the words fell from his lips, as

seizing pen and paper he set them down and signed them.

"Is that the answer?" asked the waiting lad as Babar held out the

missive impatiently. "Am I to take that to my mistress?" A faint

hesitancy over the latter words made the young man look at the boy--a

dull, rather sullen face, but not ill-looking.

"Yes!" he replied joyously. "Take it to thy mistress. It is my answer,

now and always!"

The lad _salaamed_ and went, leaving Babar in a heaven of perfect

content.

Two days later, on Friday evening, however, he was waiting to fulfil

his promise in Ali-Shir's tomb. Absolutely Oriental as his outlook

was, so far as marriage was concerned, he yet wondered, vaguely, if he

were fool or knave in acting as he did. For the path of true love,

never very rough when Kings are concerned, had been made very smooth,

indeed, for the two young people. Babar had sent his Akam to see his

Yenkam and the whole affair had been settled in five minutes with

enthusiasm. Even the preliminaries had been arranged. It being nigh

December, Babar should return to Kabul and make preparations there,

while Yenkam would complete hers at Herat, and with the first blink of

returning spring, the marriage should take place at some intermediate

place. Meanwhile the young people, after Chagatai fashion, had been

allowed to see each other and were in the seventh heaven of delight.

The betrothals were to be made public in a few days; though already

Babar's conduct was suspicious. For he refrained from his cousin's

convivial parties and mooned about in the gardens composing "Sonnets

of the Heart," as he was pleased to call them, in his native Turkhi

which gave him much more freedom than the severely technical Persian

odes.

These he sent as written to his dearest dear, and they invariably

brought back the most beautiful replies, more correct, if not

quite as genuine in feeling, as his own effusions. He felt he was,

indeed, in luck to find so peerless a maid, perfect in beauty and in

intelligence. One of these compositions--the last--lay in his

waist-wallet, as he waited in Ali-Shir's tomb. The moon had not yet

risen, and all was dark. Yet he got up once or twice from the parapet

rail on which he sat, and paced aimlessly up and down.

In truth he was restless; vaguely dissatisfied with himself. He was

going to explain, of course--oh, yes! he would explain; but it might

have been better to write. Yet how could he, knowing neither her name

nor where she lived? He could have found out of course; but that might

have been to put his paternal aunts on the scent. They were dear

creatures, but dreadful scandalmongers. Besides he had so much to say.

A personal explanation would be easier; less abrupt, kinder. Not that

he meant to back out--far from it. He was ready to be a good, just,

generous husband; unless of course, the nameless one preferred not to

take second place, as she must do. There was no helping that. It was

not his fault. Love had come ...

He paced quicker as he remembered the words which had so touched

him-- "And God the Father may send a father's love to the mother of

his son." Well! God send He might; though that would be a different

sort of love altogether from this absorbing passion. Anyhow he could

do no more. A Kazi, able if necessary to perform the marriage

ceremony, was within call. He, himself, was ready. All that was

wanting was the lady. Surely she was late in coming.

A rustle made him start and listen; but it was only the doves in the

orange trees.

No one! No one!

The moon rose after a time over the garden and flooded the terraces

with such silvern brilliance that the very pebbles on the path showed

distinct.

But no one came--no one!

Could she have heard?

Impossible; it was still a Court secret, and she was a religious

recluse--so far as he knew.

Besides; even if she had changed her mind, she might have come--or

sent a message.

So, at last, in rather an ill humour he went back to the Palace and

dismissed the waiting Kazi with a handsome fee.

There was one more Friday ere he left Herat; and, feeling ill-used,

sore, yet in a way mightily relieved, he waited in Ali-Shir's tomb for

another hour or so. No one should say _he_ had failed in his part of

the bargain! He was quite ready. Besides he had told the woman plainly

that he was not in love with her; so she had no right to feel

aggrieved. If she did.

But that could scarcely be. Every good Mussulman knew she had no claim

to a whole man--though little Ma'asuma had every bit of him. Yea!

every bit. So it was as well, doubtless, that no one came.

And as he went back to the palace his only regret was that he should

have called the nameless one "My moon."

The title belonged to his love, of right; but she would, she could

never bear it because of the nameless one who had changed her

mind--apparently; but she had not sent back his ring!

CHAPTER V

Forward and onward! do not ask the task,

Fortune importune! Is not strife true life?

Kasim-beg was in a fever to leave Herat. Marriage, he said, was good,

and it was proper to choose a cousin, who was doubtless charming;

though for his part he believed the rather in choice by outsiders; for

if the result was not happy there was no self blame, and self blame

was the devil for destroying decent calm. But Kingship was more

important still, and as the Most High had not been so very secure on

his new throne before he had started, he simply could not afford to be

away more than six months.

And Babar could not but admit his faithful old minister was right. So

he said farewell reluctantly to little Ma'asuma and started at the

head of his small army for Kabul. And as he rode up the last slope

whence he could see the gilded city of Herat, he told himself he could

not have done it better. He had seen everything--he ran over the list

of the sights in his mind, and found eighty-two of them! In fact the

only one worthy of notice which he had omitted was a certain convent.

He flushed a little at the remembrance, and set the thought aside with

self-complacence that he had come through the temptations of the most

luxurious town in the world quite unscathed. He had not played any

indecent or scurvy tricks, he had not touched wine. He had altogether

been quite a virtuous prince. So, with characteristic buoyancy,

despite the fact that he had said good-bye to his first and only love,

he settled himself in the saddle, and his face for home.

Here difficulties arose at once. It began to snow the very day they

left Herat, and Babar was for taking the low road for safety's sake.

It was the longer of course, but the hill road was at all times

difficult and dangerous; in snow practically impassable.

But Kasim-Beg, who had been in a fuss for days, behaved very

perversely, so that in the end Babar gave way and they started for the

passes, taking one Binai, an old mountaineer, as their guide. Now

whether it was from old age, or from his heart failing him at the

unusual depth of the drifts, is uncertain; but this is sure--having

once lost the path he never could find it again so as to point out the

way!

However, as Kasim-Beg and his sons were anxious to preserve their

reputation as route-choosers, they dismounted, beat down the snow and

discovered something like a road along which the party--much reduced

by defections due to the delights of Herat--managed to advance for a

day, when it was brought to a complete stand by the depth of the snow,

which was such that the horses' feet did not touch the ground. Seeing

no other remedy, Babar ordered a retreat to a ravine where there was

abundance of firewood, and thence despatched sixty or seventy chosen

men, to return by the road they had come, and, retracing their

footsteps, to find on the lower ground any Huzaras or other people who

might be wintering there, and to bring a guide who was able to point

out the way. This done they halted in the ravine for three or four

days awaiting the return of the men who had been sent out. These did,

indeed, come back, but without having been able to find a guide.

What was to be done? Nothing but place reliance on God and push

forward. So said Babar, a light in his clear eyes as he recognised

that he was in a tight place, that before him and his lay such

hardships and sufferings as even he had scarcely undergone at any

other period of his life. But then at no other period of his life had

Love been waiting, her rosy wings fluttering, for him to win through.

"Warm yourselves to the marrow this night," he said to all. "Eat your

fill and carry firewood in place of the victuals. We shall need every

atom of strength we can save and spend."

But he himself spent a wakeful night and wrote a Turkhi verse to

console himself. It ran thus and was rather poor; though nothing else

was to be expected under such circumstances:

"Fate from my very birth has marked me down,

There is no injury I have not known,

Not one! So what care I what fortune bring?

No harm unknown can come to me, the King."

They were up betimes, a long straggling party doing their best to

struggle on by beating down the snow and so forming a road along which

the laden mules could go. It was luckily a fine day and by evening

they could count on an advance of three miles. What was more, as no

snow had fallen, they were able to send back along the beaten track

for more firewood. So it went on for two or three days. Then the men

began to be discouraged, and Babar set his teeth. With Love awaiting

him at the other side, he meant to get over the Pass.

He only had about fifteen volunteers from his immediate staff, but

those fifteen, headed by vitality incarnate, worked wonders. Every

step taken was up to the middle or the breast in soft, fresh-fallen

snow; but still it was a step, and he who followed did not sink so

far. Thus they laboured. As the vigour of the person who went first

was generally expended after he had gone a few paces, another advanced

and took his place.

"Lo! gentlemen, 'tis as good as leap-frog," cried the young leader

joyously, and thereinafter they strove for steps. And as ever Babar

came out first. "See you," he said gravely, in explanation of his own

prowess, "'tis I brought you hither; and if we do not beat hard we

shall be beaten."

At which mild joke Kasim laughed profusely, though he felt as if he

could have killed himself for having thus jeopardised his young hero's

life.

The fifteen or so who worked in trampling down the snow, next

succeeded in dragging on a riderless horse. This generally sank to the

stirrups and after ten or fifteen paces was worn out. The next fared

better and the next, and the next. And after all the led horses had

thus been brought forward, came a sorry sight. The rest of the troops,

even the best men and many who bore the title of "Noble" advancing

(not even dismounted!) along the road that had been beaten down for

them by their King! Some of them, certainly, had the grace to hang

their heads. But this was no time, Babar felt, for reproach or even

for authority. Every man who possessed spirit or emulation must have

hastened to the front without orders; and those without spirits were

worse than useless at such a time.

"We must do without them, Kasim," said the young King, when his

minister would have spoken his mind. "'Twill not mend matters with

cowards to tell them they be such. Could any tongue circle the lie I

would praise them for their bravery, but with Death staring us in the

face I stick to Truth."

And to work also. The life and soul of the fifteen, he kept them going

by jokes and quips and the singing of songs. Aye! even when storm and

snow came with blinding force and they all expected to meet death

together. Then it was that, ahead of all, Babar's full mellow voice

rang out in such ballads as:

THE HAND OF THE THIEF

The bog was black outside Kazan,

now it is red!

Last night there came a rich car-wan,

Blood has been shed!

Now Adham-Khan was over-lord,

Judging the right

Of quarr'l betwixt the Black-Sheep-Horde

And they of the White.

"Oh! Adham-Khan avenge the wrong,

Thou art the head."

"My hand holds fast the skirt that's long,"

Smiling he said.

Then rose in wrath young Zulfikar,

Girt on his sword.

"Now show I him in full durbar

Right is the Lord."

He saddled steed and rode away

Over the sand,

His hauberk rattling roundelay,

God at his hand.

And Adham-Khan, he sat in state

Holding his court.

"Now who is he who comes so late

What has he brought?"

"I bring a gift from the Black-Horde-chief,

Thy honour's friend,

And lay the hand of a common thief

On thy skirt's end."

The stiff dead hand skimmed through the air,

Lay like a stone.

Of all the court not one did dare

Right to disown.

"Oh! warrior hear! Against the right

Keep thou from strife;

But if the wrong is _done_ then fight

Fight for thy life."

They were, in truth, fighting for dear life. And there was a chance of

it ahead of them; for, nigh the top of the great Zerrin pass, lay a

cave wherein shelter might be found. At least so said Binai the guide.

But the snow fell in such quantities, the wind was so dreadful, so

terribly violent, it needed all Babar's courage not to give in.

But the rosy fluttering wings of Love would not let him yield. He

could not lose little cousin Ma'asuma. The very thought of her warmed

him; the scent of her hair came to him with the snow.

The drifts deepened, the possibility of path narrowed in the steep

defile, the days were at the shortest, with difficulty could the

horses be kept on the trampled road, yet all around was certain death

in unfathomed snow-depths.

Babar's face was stern. He was nigh his end, and he knew it.

And then, suddenly, a shout from keen-eyed Tengari, old Kasim's son.

"The cave! The cave! Yonder is the cave."

And it was; but to all appearance disappointingly small. Not large

enough to hold one-half of those seeking shelter, though the

surrounding cliffs in some measure tempered the bitter fierceness of

the wind.

"The Most High had better go in," said Kasim, as Babar set to work

arranging what best he could for his troopers. "I will see to the

men."

But Babar shook his head and went on. He felt that for him to be in

warmth and comfort while his men were in snow and drift, for him to be

enjoying sleep and ease while his followers were in trouble and

distress would be inconsistent from what he owed them and a deviation

from that society in suffering that was their due.

"'Death in the company of friends is a feast.' At any rate, so runs

the proverb," he remarked lightly. "And indeed, Kasim, having brought

these poor souls to this pass, it is but right that whatever their

sufferings and difficulties, whatever they may have to undergo, I

should be equal sharer in all."

So when he had done what he could and shown others what to do, he took

a hoe and dug down in the snow as deep as his breast without reaching

the ground, then crouched down in it. The day was darkening, evening

prayer time had passed, and still belated troopers came dropping in.

The snow was now falling so fast that the men in the dug-out shelter

ran some chance of being smothered as they slept from sheer fatigue.

Babar himself found four inches of snow above him as he scrambled out

of his hole when a last party straggled in, bringing Binai the guide,

with the welcome news that the cave was far larger than hasty

observation would expect, and that a narrow passage led to quite a

spacious cavern within where there was ample room for all.

Joyful news indeed! Sending out to call in all his men, Babar soon

found himself, by one of his own extraordinary changes of luck, in a

wonderfully warm, safe, and comfortable place. For there proved to be

firewood within the cave, and such as had any eatables, stewed meat,

preserved flesh, or anything else they might have, produced them for a

common meal. Thus all escaped, as by a miracle, from the terrible

cold, the snow, the bitter, bitter wind.

And the rosy wings of Love fluttered gaily, as Babar laid himself down

to sleep--the first sleep he had had for days.

It was the turning point; though there was still distress and misery

to come.

The snow, however, had ceased to fall by the morning, the wind had

died down. Moving with the first blink of dawn they still had to tread

down the snow in the old way: but it was with more hope. The cave in

which they had rested was, as they were aware, close to the beginning

of the last steep ascent to the Great Pass. This, the shortest way,

they knew to be impassable, and even Kasim and his sons, warned by

experience, did not advise its attempt. Bad enough was a lower valley

road of which old Binai the guide had vaguely heard. Yet it was their

only chance, so they took it. But evening found them still in the

defile; and such was its precipitate nature, that there was nothing

for it but for every man to halt where he found himself, dismount,

scrape a hole in the snow for himself and his horse if possible, and

so await the tardy dawn to bring sufficient light for safe advance. It

was an awful night. The retreat of the storm had brought frost; icy,

keen, piercing; and though none of the hardy troopers actually lost

their lives, many lost hands and feet from frostbite. Babar himself

kept his blood warm by pacing up and down, singing at the top of his

voice with that curious instinct of shouting which comes always to

humanity with the grip of cold. Mayhap it cheered the others to hear

the mellow melodious chants echoing so blithely over the snow.

He sang many things, but his favourite was the

SONG OF THE SMILING SHEPHERD

From Sunset until Dawn-of-Day,

My forehead frozen with the Frost,

I shut mine eyes like Wolf-at-Bay

And sing to find the Sheep I've lost.

When Angels walk at Break-of-Day

Among pale wormwood on the lea,

Upon the Night-of-Power, they say,

My smiling soul came unto me.

It had a palace of pure gold

In Paradise and yet it chose

To leave the Heat-of-Heaven for Cold

And help me find the Sheep I love.

So in the Dark and in the Snow

We twain make up one Perfect-Whole

And sing glad songs the while we go

A Smiling-Shepherd, Smiling-Soul.

Dawn came at last and they moved down the glen. It was not the usual

road,--that was more circuitous--but with the snow filling up the

valley and obliterating precipices, ravines, crevasses, there seemed a

chance of being able to manage a shorter route, and time meant so much

to those exhausted men.

Yet Babar himself halted for awhile, and so did a few of his immediate

followers when his horse stumbled, fell, could not rise.

"Take mine, my liege," said half-a-dozen voices. But the young man's

face set.

"I will not leave the beast," he said resolutely. "It hath done me

good service and may do it again. See you! bring some of the men's

lances and their halter ropes. Samur and I live together, or die

together," and he laid his young cheek to the horse's soft muzzle

affectionately.

Then starting up, he set the men to work to form a criss-cross raft or

sledge of lances on to which Samur was pulled by main force.

"'Tis all down hill now," said he when it was finished, and seizing a

rope strained at it.

"Nay! Sire!" remarked old Kasim drily--"If the Most Excellent choose

to risk lives for the sake of a dumb brute, let them be the lives of

dumb brutes, not Kings. Troopers! Six horses to save one!"

Babar hung his head, but held to the rope.

"Doubtless I am a brute also," he murmured half to himself, "so let me

be dumb; save for this--God made me so!"

The staunch old warrior heard the words and shook his head. Yet in his

heart of hearts he would not have altered one jot or one tittle in his

idol. Zahir-ud-din Mahomed Babar was for him the first gentleman in

the world.

"Truly," said the latter with pious cheerfulness after a time, during

which the sledge slipped easily down the steep slopes of snow, "it is

well said

'Looked at wisely with clear eyes

Ills are blessings in disguise.'

But for this extreme depth of snow which till now hath seemed our

worst enemy, we should all be tumbling down precipices and being lost

in crevasses."

This was obvious; but it cheered the party, until in the far distance

something more tangible showed to bring sudden alacrity to outwearied

steps.

A hut surely!

And that figure on the lessening snow slopes--was it a man?

Still it was nigh bed-time prayers before they extricated themselves

from the mouth of the valley and the villagers of Yaka-Aulang came out

to meet the forlorn party, to help, and even to carry, some of them

into warm houses, and thereinafter to slaughter fat sheep for them,

bring a superfluity of hay and grass for their horses, and abundance

of wood to kindle their fires.

Once again Babar felt that to pass from the cold and snow into such a

village with its warm houses, and to escape from want and suffering to

find such plenty of good bread and fat sheep as they did, was an

enjoyment that can only be conceived by such as have suffered similar

hardships, or endured such heavy distress.

But better by far to him than this material satisfaction, was the glow

at his heart when an old white-headed patriarch nodding by the

fireside, mumbled--

"Never has it been done before, never since the memory of man hath

Zerrin been passed in such snow. Never hath any man ever conceived

even the idea of passing it at such season--Never! Never!"