ns of procuring or making any other shroud.

As for Khatun, the queen-mother, when she heard the tidings of her
son's death, and was informed, at the same time, that her favorite
Kothboddin had been set aside, and Jalaloddin, whom she hated, and
who, she presumed, hated her, had been made his successor, she was in
a great rage. She was at that time at Karazm, which was the capital,
and she attempted to persuade the officers and soldiers near her not
to submit to the sultan's decree, but to make Kothboddin their
sovereign after all.

While she was engaged in forming this conspiracy, the news reached the
city that the Monguls were coming. Khatun immediately determined to
flee to save her life. She had, it seems, in her custody at Karazm
twelve children, the sons of various princes that reigned in different
parts of the empire or in the environs of it. These children were
either held as hostages, or had been made captive in insurrections and
wars, and were retained in prison as a punishment to their fathers.
The queen-mother found that she could not take these children with
her, and so she ordered them all to be slain. She was afraid that the
Monguls, when they came, might set them free.

As soon as she was gone the city fell into great confusion on account
of the struggles for power between the two parties of Jalaloddin and
Kothboddin. But the sultana, who had made the mischief, did not
trouble herself to know how it would end. Her only anxiety was to save
her own life. After various wanderings and adventures, she at last
found her way into a very retired district of country lying on the
southern shore of the Caspian, between the mountains and the sea, and
here she sought refuge in a castle or fortress named Ilan, where she
thought she was secure from all pursuit. She brought with her to the
castle her jewels and all her most valuable treasures.

But Genghis Khan had spies in every part of the country, and he was
soon informed where Khatun was concealed. So he sent a messenger to a
certain Mongul general named Hubbe Nevian, who was commanding a
detachment in that part of the country, informing him that Khatun was
in the castle of Ilan, and commanding him to go and lay siege to it,
and to take it at all hazards, and to bring Khatun to him either dead
or alive.

Hubbe immediately set off for the castle. The queen-mother, however,
had notice of his approach, and the lords who were with her urged her
to fly. If she woul