him little, {14} if there had not existed
jealousies and divisions in the hostile camp. These worked for him so
as to secure to him all that remained of Ferghana. But he had lost
the important towns of Khojend, Marghinan, and Uratiupe.

For two years after the retirement of the invader, the boy rested,
consolidating his resources, and watching his opportunity. Then,
troubles having arisen in Samarkand, he made a dash at that city,
then the most important in Central Asia. He forced its surrender
(November, 1497), but as he would not allow his troops to pillage,
these deserted him by thousands. He held on, however, until the news
that Ferghana was invaded compelled him to quit his hold. On the eve
of his departure he was prostrated by a severe illness, and when at
length he reached Ferghana it was to hear that his capital had
surrendered to his enemies. He was, in fact, a king without a
kingdom. 'To save Andijan,' he wrote, 'I had given up Samarkand: and
now I found that I had lost the one without preserving the other.'

He persevered, however, recovered Ferghana, though a Ferghana
somewhat shorn of its proportions, and once more made a dash at
Samarkand. The Uzbeks, however, forced him to raise the siege, and,
his own dominions having in the interval been overrun and conquered,
he fell back in the direction of Kesh, his birthplace. After many
adventures and strivings with fortune, he resolved with the aid of
the very few adherents who remained to him, to return and {15}
attempt the surprise of Samarkand. It was a very daring venture, for
his entire following numbered but two hundred and forty men. He made
the attempt, was foiled; renewed it, and succeeded. He was but just
in time. For the last of the garrison had but just yielded, when the
chief of the Uzbeks was seen riding hard for the place, at the head
of the vanguard of his army. He had to retire, baffled.

But Babar could not keep his conquest. The following spring the
Uzbeks returned in force. To foil them Babar took up a very strong
position outside the city, on the Bokhara road, his right flank
covered by the river Kohik. Had he been content to await his enemy in
this position, he would probably have compelled him to retire, for it
was too strong to be forced. But he was induced by the astrologers,
against his own judgment, to advance beyond it to attack the Uzbek
army. In the battle which followed, and which he almost won, he was
eventually beaten, and retre