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 Chap. V.]

FORTUNi:S OF BABEH.

107

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for his paternal domiuions were dearer to hini than any new conquest, however valuable, and he could not brook the idea of having them dismembered by the perfidy of a brother. He accordingly set out towards Indijan, but he arrived oidy in time enough t(^ learn that the officers to whom the defence of it wa« intrusted, had been induced, by a rumour of his death, to surrender, and that Jehangir had actually mounted the throne. Both Samarcand and Indijan were thus lost. Baber wiis now in the utmost distress, and applied for aid to his maternal uncle, Sultan Mahmood Klian. His brother Jehangir applied at the same time, and Mahmood, unwilling to interfere in the quarrels of his nephews, gave no assistance to either. Ultimately, however, he departed so far from this resolution as to take open ]>art with Baber, who, after various vicissitudes, recovered his paternal kingdom in 1499. He even set out to attempt the recovery of Samarcand, but was only on the way when he received the morti- fying intelligence that the Usbeks had anticipated him, and made themselves masters both of Samarcand and Bokhara. The consequence was, that he was not only frustrated in the hope of taking Samarcand, but again lost Ferghana, which had been oveiTun in his absence.

His only resource was to betake him- self to the mountains, and wait there till fortune should again smile upon him. While almost disconsolate at the disasters which had Wallen him, he lay down in a grove to sleep, and dreamed that AbdoUah, a dervis of grwit re])ute, cjxlled at his iiou.se. He invited him to sit down, and ordered a table-cloth to be spread for him; but the dervis, apjiarently offended, rose to go away. While Baber endeavoured to detain him, the dervis took hold of his arm, and lifled him up towards the sky. The ch'eam is neither striking nor .significant; but Baber and his followers regarded it as a promise of future good fortune, and determined, in consequence, to make another attempt on Samarcand. The captm'e of the city was one of the exploits on which Baber particularly j)hnned himself, and he dwells on it with evident exultation in his ^femoil•s. Here, however, only the leading facts can be mentioned. His small ])arty mustered only 320 men, and yet with these he succeeded in making himself master of a large ca])ital, occupied by warlike Usbeks, whom Sheebani Khan, a veteran general of high rej)utation, commanded. Having secretly arrived in the vicinity at midnight, he sent forward <-ighty of his party to a low part of the wall, which they immediately scaled by means of a gi-ap})ling-rope. Going

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Usbeks of Khoondooz, and a Kiiojaii ok Usbf.k

Taktarv.— From Rattmy's AfKh&ni5tan &iid Klpliiiistoiie's Cabool.

neniarkal)l8 rv covery of Sainarcaiid