Where are those sports, those stables, and those horses ?
Where those bugles and clarions ?
Where are those who buckled on their swords and were mighty in battle ? where those scarlet uniforms ?
Where those mirrors and fair faces ? we see them no longer here.
This world is Thine, O Lord of the earth.
In one ghari Thou establishest and disestablishest; Thou distributest wealth as Thou pleasest.
Where are those houses, those mansions, and those palaces?
where those beautiful seraglios ?
Where are those easy couches and those women a sight of whom banished sleep ?
Where is that betel, those betel-sellers, and those fair ones ? They have vanished.
For wealth many are ruined ; this wealth hath disgraced many.
It is not amassed without sin, and it departeth not with the dead.
Him whom the Creator destroyeth He first depriveth of virtue.
Millions of priests tried by their miraculous power to restrain the emperor when they heard of his approach.
He burned houses, mansions, and palaces ; he cut princes to pieces, and had them rolled in the dust.
No Mughal hath become blind ; no priest hath wrought a miracle.
There was a contest between the Mughals and Pathans ; the sword was wielded in the battle.
One side aimed and discharged their guns, the other also handled their weapons :
They whose letter[1] hath been torn in God s court must die, my brethren.
There were the wives of Hindus, of Turks, of Bhattis, and of Rajputs.
- ↑ In India when announcing the death of a relation it is usual for the writer to tear the top of the letter. The reference here is to that custom.
