Machine transcription
-167-
his issuing the order for Prince Timour to return to Herat, and then quickly placing Sulaiman upon the throne are matters which are apparently against the Vazir. There is, however, the element of the wrong reporting on behalf of the rivals of the Vazir at the court, for at that period of our history, such elements were unfortunately rife and had their power, and thus they may have contributed towards the severing of friendly relations between the Vazir and the Prince.
When the news of the accession to the throne of Prince Sulaiman reached the ears of his elder brother at Herat, he (Timour) at once started for Kandahar. According to the records of the time, a good number of the heads of the clans, who did not see eye to eye with the Vazir also left Kandahar to receive Prince Timour on his way to Kandahar. Some were headed by such Sirdars as Sirdar Madad Khan Isshaqzai.
The somewhat surprising fact is this that on one side the Vazir was said to have placed his son in law on the throne, and on the other hand, he himself also started westward to receive Prince Timour. An explanation is given by saying that the Vazir had placed Prince Sulaiman on the throne, so that no interim difficulties about the accession may occur. Thus in reality the Vazir was in favour of Prince Timour. But those who surrounded Prince Timour had poisoned the ears of the Prince to such a degree that the Prince would not see the Vazir on his way to Kandahar.
It is reported that the Vazir and the Prince were very near Farah one coming from Herat and the other from Kandahar. The prince had a large army with him, while the Vazir was accompanied by only one hundred and fifty horsemen.
As soon as those who accompanied the prince heard of the Vazir's arrival at Farah, they advised the prince with the connivance of Qazi Faizullah Khan, that the Vazir should be killed, and that he should certainly not see the Vazir, because the purpose of his reception by the Vazir was no other than to deceive him.
Roughly two thirds of characters agree with a modern printed edition of the same text. Much of the disagreement is editorial, not misreading. Treat the transcription as a finding aid and read the page image before quoting. How this was measured.
