Having discussed the position with all my begs and unmailed braves, we left it at this;—that as Shaibānī Khān had taken possession of Samarkand so recently, the Samarkandīs would not be attached to him nor he to them; that if we made an effort at once, we might do the thing; that if we set ladders up and took the fort by surprise, the Samarkandīs would be for us; how should they not be? even if they gave us no help, they would not fight us for the Aūzbegs; and that Samarkand once in our hands, whatever was God's will, would happen. Acting on this decision, we rode out of Yār-yīlāq after the Mid-day Prayer, and on through the dark till mid-night when we reached Khān-yūrtī. Here we had word that the Samarkandīs knew of our coming; for this reason we went no nearer to the town but made straight back from Khān-yūrtī. It was dawn when, after crossing the Kohik-water below Rabāṯ-i-khwāja, we were once more in Yār-yīlāq. One day in Fort Asfīdik a household party was sitting in my presence; Dost-i-nāṣir and Nuyān[543] _Kūkūldāsh_ and Khān-qulī-i-Karīm-dād and Shaikh Darwesh and Mīrīm-i-nāṣir were all there. Words were crossing from all sides when (I said), 'Come now! say when, if God bring it right, we shall take [Sidenote: Fol. 83b.] Samarkand.' Some said, 'We shall take it in the heats.' It was then late in autumn. Others said, 'In a month,' 'Forty days,' 'Twenty days.' Nuyān _Kūkūldāsh_ said, 'We shall take it in 14.' God shewed him right! we did take it in exactly 14 days. Just at that time I had a wonderful dream;—His Highness Khwāja `Ubaid'l-lāh (_Aḥrārī_) seemed to come; I seemed to go out to give him honourable meeting; he came in and seated himself; people seemed to lay a table-cloth before him, apparently without sufficient care and, on account of this, something seemed to come into his Highness Khwāja's mind. Mullā Bābā (? _Pashāgharī_) made me a sign; I signed back, 'Not through me! the table-layer is in fault!' The Khwāja understood and accepted the excuse.[544] When he rose, I escorted him out. In the hall of that house he took hold of either my right or left arm and lifted me up till one of my feet was off the ground, saying, in Turkī, 'Shaikh Maṣlaḥat has given (Samarkand).'[545] I really took Samarkand a few days later. (_d. Bābur takes Samarkand by surprise._)