b. Bo-bur's defeat at Kul-i-malik.
In Safar (April-May) 'Ubaid moved swiitly down and attacked the Bukhara neighbourhood. Babur went from Samarkand to meet him. Several details of what followed, not given by Haidar and, in one particular, contradicting him, are given by Khwand-amlr. The statement in which the two historians contradict one another is Haidar's that 'Ubaid had 3000 men only, Babur 40,000 Several considerations give to Khwandamlr's opposed statement that Babur's force was small, the semblance of being nearer the fact. Haidar, it may be said, did not go out on this campaign ; he was ill in Samarkand and continued ill there for some time ; Khwand-amlr's details have the well-informed air of things learned at first-hand, perhaps from some-one in Hindustan after 934 AH
Matters which make against Babur's having a large effective force at Kul-i-malik, and favour Khwand-amlr's statement about the affair are these : 'Ubaid must have formed some estimate of what he -had to meet, and he brought 3000 men. Where could Babur have obtained 40,000 men worth reckoning in a fight ? In several times of crisis his own immediate and everfaithful troop is put at 500 ^ as his cause was now unpopular, local accretions may have been few. Some Mughuls from Merv y and from Kabul were near Samarkand (T.R. pp. 263, 265) ; most were with Sa'ld in Andijan ; but however many Mughuls may have been in his neighbourhood, none could be counted on as resolute for his success. If too, he had had more than a small effective force, would he not have tried to hold Samarkand with the remnant of defeat until Persian help arrived ? All things considered, there is giound for accepting Khwand-amlr's statement that Babur met 'Ubaid with a small force.
Following his account therefore : Babur in his excess of daring, marched to put the Auzbeg down with a small force only, against the advice of the prudent, of whom Muhammad Mazld Tarkhan was one, who all said it was wrong to go out unprepared and without reinforcement. Paying them no attention, Babur marched for Bukhara, was rendered still more daring by news had when he neared it, that the enemy had retired some stages, and followed him up almost to his camp. 'Ubaid was
