710 TRANSLATOR'S NOTE
Father's body to that place.1 That the widow who performed this duty was the Afghan Lady, Blbl Mubarika2 is made probable by Giil-badan's details of the movements of the royal ladies. Babur's family left Agra under Hind-al's escort, after the defeat at Chausa (June 7th, 1539 AD.); whoever took charge of the body on its journey to Kabul must have returned at some later date to fetch it. It would be in harmony with Sher Shah's generous character if he safe-guarded her in her task.
The terraced garden Babur chose for his burial-place lies on the slope of the hill Shah-i-Kabul, the Sher-darwaza of European writers.3 It has been described as perhaps the most beautiful of the Kabul gardens, and as looking towards an unsurpassable view over the Char-dih plain towards the snows of Paghman and the barren, rocky hills which have been the hunting-grounds of rulers in Kabul. Several of Babur's descendants coming to Kabul from Agra have visited and embellished his burial-garden. Shah-i-jahan built the beautiful mosque which stands near the grave; Jahanglr seems to have been, if not the author, at least the prompter of the well-cut inscription adorning the upright slab of white marble of Maldan, which now stands at the gravehead. The tomb-stone itself is a low grave-covering, not less simple than those of relations and kin whose remains have been placed near Babur's. In the thirties of the last century [the later Sir] Alexander Burnes visited and admirably described the garden and the tomb. With him was MunshI Mohan Lai who added to his own account of the beauties of the spot, copies of the inscriptions on the monumental slab and on the portal of the Mosque.4 As is shown by the descriptions these two visitors give, and by Daniel's drawings of the garden and the tomb, there were in their time two upright slabs, one behind the other, near the head of the grave. Mr. H. H. Hayden who visited the garden in the first decade of the present century, shows in his photograph of the grave, one upright stone only, the place of
1 G. B.'s H. N. trs. f. 341$, p. 138 ; Jauhar's Memoirs of Humayun, Stewart's trs. p. 82.
2 Cf. G. B.'s H. N. trs. p. 216, Bio. App. s.n. Bega Begam.
3 f. 128, p. 200 n. 3. Cf. Appendix U. Babur's Gardens in and near Kabul.
4 Cf. H. H. Hayden's AToles on some monuments in Afghanistan, [Memoirs of the Asiatic Society of Bengal ii, 344]; and Journal asiatique 1888, M. J. Darmesteter's art. Inscriptions de Caboul.
