ted in the complete submission
of Khusrou, whose troops came over in crowds to Babar. Thus
strengthened, Babar marched upon Kabul, besieged it, and took it
(October, 1504). By this sudden change of fortune, he found himself
all at once King of Kabul and Ghazni, a kingdom far more powerful
than the Ferghana which he had inherited and lost.

Babar had but just began to feel his seat in his new kingdom when he
received an invitation to invade a district called Bhera, south of
the river Jehlam, and therefore within the borders of India. The
invitation was too agreeable to his wishes to be refused, and he
accordingly set out for Jalalabad. The time was January, 1505. The
Sultan--for so he was styled--records in his journals the impression
produced upon him by the first sight of that favoured part of Asia,
an impression shared, doubtless, by his successors in the path of
invasion, and which may well account for their determination to push
on. 'I had never before,' he wrote, 'seen warm countries nor the
country of {19} Hindustan. On reaching them, I all at once saw a new
world; the vegetables, the plants, the trees, the wild animals, all
were different. I was struck with astonishment, and indeed there was
room for wonder.' He then proceeded by the Khaibar Pass to Peshawar,
and, not crossing the Indus, marched by Kohat, Bangash, Banu, and
Desht Daman, to Multan. Thence he followed the course of the Indus
for a few days, then turned westward, and returned to Kabul by way of
Chotiali and Ghazni. The expedition has been called Babar's first
invasion of India, but as he only touched the fringes of the country,
it took rather the character of a reconnoitring movement. Such as it
was, it filled him with an earnest desire to take an early
opportunity to see more.

But, like every other conqueror who has been attracted by India, he
deemed it of vital importance to secure himself in the first place of
Kandahar. Internal troubles for a time delayed the expedition. Then,
when these had been appeased, external events came to demand his
attention. His old enemy, Shaibani, was once more ruling at
Samarkand, and, after some lesser conquests, had come to lay siege to
Balkh. Sultan Husen Mirza of Herat, alarmed at his progress, sent at
once a messenger to Babar to aid him in an attack on the invader.
Babar at once responded, and setting out from Kabul in June, 1506,
reached Kahmerd, and halted there to collect and store supplies. He
was enga