Page:History of India Vol 5.djvu/145

 A TUEKISH SLAVE -BOY 111 told in the annals of Nasir-ad-din, which were written by Minhaj-as-Siraj, the Mohammedan historian who has already been quoted at length, and an excerpt from his work forms a suitable chapter to trace the upward steps by which Ulugh Khan rose to fame. 1 The Sultan Ulugh Khan-i-Azam, otherwise called Ghiyas-ad-din Balban, belonged to the stock of the Khakans of Albari. His father was khan over ten thousand houses (khanah), and the family was well known in Albari, among the Turkish tribes of Turk- istan. Now, inasmuch as the Almighty desired to grant a support to the power of Islam and strength to the Mohammedan faith, to extend His glorious shadow over it, and to preserve Hindustan within the range of His favour and protection, He removed Ulugh Khan in his youth from Turkistan, separating hi from his race and kindred, and from his tribe and relations, and con- veying him to the country of Hindustan, for the pur- pose of curbing the Moghuls. God conducted him to Baghdad, and from that city to Gujarat, where Khwaja Jamal-ad-din Basri, a man remarkable for piety and integrity, ability and worth, purchased him and brought him up carefully like a son. Intelligence and ability shone out clearly in his countenance, and his patron, Jamal, looked upon him with an eye of kindness and treated him with especial consideration. In the year 630 A. H. (1232 A. D.), Jamal-ad-din took Ulugh Khan to Delhi, in the days when Sultan Shams- ad-din Altamish adorned the throne; and when the Sultan perceived that Ulugh was a youth of great prom-