A SPLENDID FEAST 97 



channels. These form an inner and an outer 

 square enclosing the high platform of the tomb, 

 ornamented, wherever the paths cross each other, 

 with a small tank, sometimes on the same level, 

 sometimes sunk in the centre of a raised chabutra. 

 The numerous little tanks are outwardly square, 

 with a lower inside ledge of stone, modifying them 

 into oval, octagonal, or round water basins, 

 the whole effect being reminiscent of the shal- 

 low fountains and narrow watercourses of the 

 earliest gardens in Kashmir. The illustration, 

 Plate XV. from the copy of Babar's Memoirs, 

 gives a picture of the feast of the birth of 

 Humayun, which takes place in just such a 

 garden. 



After his son's birth, Babar, who was at Kabul 

 at the time, and had newly styled himself Badshah 

 (Emperor), went, as was customary on such occa- 

 sions, to the Char Bagh outside the city for four or 

 five days to celebrate the festival of Humayun's 

 nativity. " Those who were Begs, and those 

 who were not," he writes, " great and small, 

 brought their offerings. Bags of silver money 

 were heaped up. I never before saw so much 

 white money in one place. It was a very splendid 

 feast." 



13 



