towards Hindustân, but none higher up than this hill. The inhabitants used formerly to keep hogs, but in my time they have renounced the practice.'

standing water is to be met with. All these cities and countries derive their water from wells or tanks, in which it is collected during the rainy season. Ip Hindustan, the populousness and decay, or tota His account of the productions of his pater-destruction of villages, nay of cities, is almost in nal kingdom of Ferghana is still more minute stantaneous. Large cities that have been inhabited -telling us even the number of apple-trees for a series of years, (if, on an alarm, the inhabitants in a particular district, and making mention take to flight.) in a single day, or a day and a half, of an excellent way of drying apricots, with are so completely abandoned, that you can scarcely almonds put in instead of the stones; and of discover a trace or mark of population."* a wood with a fine red bark, of admirable use The prejudices of the more active and for making whip-handles and birds' cages! energetic inhabitant of the hill country are The most remarkable piece of statistics, how- still more visible in the following passage:ever, with which he has furnished us, is in "Hindustan is a country that has few pleasures his account of Hindustan, which he first en- to recommend it. The people are not handsome. tered as a conqueror in 1525. It here occu-They have no idea of the charms of friendly society, pies twenty-five closely-printed quarto pages; of frankly mixing together, or of familiar intercourse. and contains, not only an exact account of its They have no genius, no comprehension of mind, no politeness of manner, no kindness or fellow. boundaries, population, resources, revenues, feeling, no ingenuity or mechanical invention in and divisions, but a full enumeration of all its planning or executing their handicraft works, ne useful fruits, trees, birds, beasts, and fishes; skill or knowledge in design or architecture; they with such a minute description of their sev- have no good horses, no good flesh, no grapes or eral habitudes and peculiarities, as would make musk-melonst, no good fruits, no ice or cold water, no good food or bread in their bazars, no baths or no contemptible figure in a modern work of colleges, no candles, no torches, not a candlestick." natural history-carefully distinguishing the facts which rest on his own observation from those which he gives only on the testimony of others, and making many suggestions as to the means of improving, or transferring them from one region to another. From the detailed botanical and zoological descriptions, we can afford of course to make no extracts. What follows is more general:—

"The chief excellency of Hindustan is, that it is a large country, and has abundance of gold and silver. The climate during the rains is very pleasant. n some days it rains ten, fifteen, and even twenty pouring down all at once, and form rivers, even in times. During the rainy season, inundations come places where, at other times, there is no water. While the rains continue on the ground, the air is singularly delightful-insomuch, that nothing can surpass its soft and agreeable temperature. Its defect is, that the air is rather moist and damp. "Hindustan is situated in the first, second, and During the rainy season, you cannot shoot, even third climates. No part of it is in the fourth. It is with the bow of our country, and it becomes quite a remarkably fine country. It is quite a different useless. Nor is it the bow alone that becomes world, compared with our countries. Its hills and useless; the coats of mail, books, clothes, and furrivers, its forests and plains, its animals and plants. niture, all feel the bad effects of the moisture. its inhabitants and their languages, its winds and Their houses, too, suffer from not being substanrains, are all of a different nature. Although the tially built. There is pleasant enough weather in Germsîls (or hot districts), in the territory of Kabul, the winter and summer, as well as in the rainy bear, in many respects, some resemblance to Hin-season; but then the north wind always blows, and dustân, while in other particulars they differ, yet you have no sooner passed the river Sind than the country, the trees, the stones, the wandering tribes, the manners and customs of the people, are all entirely those of Hindustân. The northern range of hills has been mentioned. Immediately on crossing the river Sind, we come upon several countries in this range of mountains, connected with Kashmir, such as Pekheli and Shemeng. Most of them, though now independent of Kashmir, were formerly included in its territories. After leaving Kashmir, these hills contain innumerable tribes and states, Pergannahs and countries, and extend all the way to Bengal and the shores of the Great Ocean. About these hills are other tribes of men."

there is an excessive quantity of earth and dust fly. ing about. When the rains are at hand, this wind blows five or six times with excessive violence, and artifical canals or water-runs for irrigation, and for the supply of water to towns and villages. The same is the case in the valley of Soghd, and the richer parts of Mâweralnaher.

This is the wulsa or walsa, so well described by Colonel Wilks in his Historical Sketches, vol. i. p. 309, note: On the approach of an hostile army, the unfortunate inhabitants of India bury under ground their most cumbrous effects, and each individual, man, woman, and child above six years of age, (the infant children being carried by their ex-mothers,) with a load of grain proportioned to their strength, issue from their beloved homes, and take the direction of a country (if such can be found) exempt from the miseries of war; sometimes of a strong fortress, but more generally of the most unfrequented hills and woods, where they prolong a miserable existence until the departure of the enemy; and if this should be protracted beyond the time for which they have provided food, a large portion necessarily dies of hunger.' See the note itself. The Historical Sketches should be read by every one who desires to have an accurate idea of the South of India. It is to be regretted that we do not possess the history of any other part of India, written with the same knowledge or research.'

"The country and towns of Hindustan are tremely ugly. All its towns and lands have an uniform look: its gardens have no walls; the greater part of it is a level plain. The banks of its rivers and streams, in consequence of the rushing of the torrents that descend during the rainy season, are worn deep into the channel, which makes it generally difficult and troublesome to cross them. In many places the plain is covered by a thorny brush-wood, to such a degree that the people of the Pergannahs, relying on these forests, take shelter in them, and, trusting to their inaccessible situation, often continue in a state of revolt, refusing to pay their taxes. In Hindustân, if you except the rivers, there is little running water. Now and then some

This practice Baber viewed with disgust, the hog being an impure animal in the Muhammedan law. The Ils and Ulûses."

In Persia there are few rivers, but numbers of

+ Baber's opinions regarding India are nearly the same with those of most Europeans of the upper class, even at the present day.

Grapes and musk-melons, particularly the lat ter, are now common all over India.

such a quantity of dust flies about that you cannot | hill country to the east of Andejân, and the snow see one another. They call this an Andhi. It fell so deep as to bury it, so that of the whole only gets warm during Taurus and Gemini, but not so two persons escaped, he no sooner received in warm as to become intolerable. The heat cannot formation of the occurrence, than he despatched be compared to the heats of Balkh and Kandahar. overseers to collect and take charge of all the prop It is not above half so warm as in these places. erty and effects of the people of the caravan; and, Another convenience of Hindustân is, that the wherever the heirs were not at hand, though himworkmen of every profession and trade are innu- self in great want, his resources being exhausted, merable and without end. For any work, or any he placed the property under sequestration, and preemployment, there is always a set ready, to whom served it untouched; till, in the course of one or the same employment and trade have descended two years, the heirs, coming from Khorasan and from father to son for ages. In the Zefer-Nâmeh Samarkand, in consequence of the intimation which of Milla Sherîf-ed-dîn Ali Yezdi, it is mentioned they received, he delivered back the goods safe as a surprising fact, that when Taimur Beg was and uninjured into their hands.* His generosity building the Sangîn (or stone) mosque, there were was large, and so was his whole soul; he was of an stone-cutters of Azerbaejan, Fârs, Hindustan, and excellent temper, affable, eloquent, and sweet in other countries, to the number of two hundred, his conversation, yet brave withal, and manly. working every day on the mosque. In Agra alone, On two occasions he advanced in front of the and of stone-cutters belonging to that place only, I troops, and exhibited distinguished prowess; once, every day employed on my palaces six hundred and at the gates of Akhsi, and once at the gates of eighty persons; and in Agra, Sikri, Biâna, Dhulpur, Shahrokhîa. He was a middling shot with the Gualiar, and Koel, there were every day employed bow; he had uncommon force in his fists, and on my works one thousand four hundred and ninety- never hit a man whom he did not knock down. one stone-cutters. In the same way, men of every From his excessive ambition for conquest, he often trade and occupation are numberless and without exchanged peace for war, and friendship for hostility. stint in Hindustân. In the earlier part of his life he was greatly addicted to drinking bûzeh and talar. Latterly, once or twice in the week, he indulged in a drink. ing party. He was a pleasant companion, and in the course of conversation used often to cite, with great felicity, appropriate verses from the poets. In his latter days he was much addicted to the use of Maajûn,† while under the influence of which he was subject to a feverish irritability. He was a humane man. He played a great deal at backgammon, and sometimes at games of chance with the dice.

"The countries from Behreh to Behâr, which are now under my dominion, yield a revenue of fifty-two krors, as will appear from the particular and detailed statement. Of this amount, Pergannahs to the value of eight or nine krors are in the possession of some Rais and Rajas, who from old times have been submissive, and have received | these Pergannahs for the purpose of confirming them in their obedience."

These Memoirs contain many hundred characters and portraits of individuals; and it would not be fair not to give our readers one or two specimens of the royal author's minute style of execution on such subjects. We may begin with that of Omer-Sheikh Mirza, his grandfather, and immediate predecessor in the throne of Ferghâna :

"Omer-Sheikh Mirza was of low stature, had a short bushy beard, brownish hair, and was very corpulent. He used to wear his tunic extremely tight; insomuch, that as he was wont to contract his belly while he tied the strings, when he let himself out again the strings often burst. He was not curious in either his food or dress. He tied his turban in the fashion called Destâr-pêch (or plaited turban). At that time, all turbans were worn in the char-pêch (or four-plait) style. He wore his without folds, and allowed the end to hang down. During the heats, when out of the Divân, he generally wore the Moghul cap.

"He read elegantly: his general reading was the Khamsahs. the Mesnevis, and books of his tory; and he was in particular fond of reading the Shahnameh.** Though he had a turn for poetry, he did not cultivate it. He was so strictly just, that when the caravan from Khitatt had once reached the

This is still the Hindustâni term for a storm, or tempest.

About a million and a half sterling, or rather 1,300,000l.

This statement unfortunately has not been preserved.

About 225,000l. sterling.

Several Persian poets wrote Khamsahs, or poems, on five different given subjects. The most celebrated is Nezami.

The most celebrated of these Mesnevis is the mystical poem of Moulavi Jiluleddin Muhammed. The Sufis consider it as equal to the Koran.

"The Shahnameh, or Book of Kings, is the famous poem of the great Persian poet Ferdausi, and contains the romantic history of ancient Persia. North China; but often applied to the whole

The following is the memorial of Hussain Mirza, king of Khorasan, who died in 1506:

"He had straight narrow eyes, his body was robust and firm; from the waist downwards he was of a slenderer make. Although he was advanced in years, and had a white beard, he dressed in gay-coloured red and green woollen clothes. He usually wore a cap of black lamb's skin, or a kilpak. Now and then, on festival days, he put on a small turban tied in three folds, broad and showy, and having placed a plume nodding over it, went in this style to prayers.

"On first mounting the throne, he took it into his head that he would cause the names of the twelve Imams to be recited in the Khutbeh. Many used their endeavours to prevent him. Finally, however, he directed and arranged every thing according to the orthodox Sunni faith. From a disorder in his joints, he was unable to perform his prayers, nor could he observe the stated fasts. He was a lively, pleasant man. His temper was rather hasty, and his language took after his temper. In many instances he displayed a profound reverence for the faith; on one occasion, one of his sons having slain a man, he delivered him up to the avengers of blood to be carried before the judgment-seat of the Kazi. For about six or seven years after he first ascended the throne, he was very guarded in abstaining from such things as were forbidden by

country from China to Terfân, and now even west to the Ala-tagh Mountains.

* This anecdote is erroneously related of Baber himself by Ferishta and others.-See Dow's Hist. of Hindostan, vol. ii. p. 218.

+ Buzch is a sort of intoxicating liquor somewhat resembling beer, made from millet. Talar I do not know, but understand it to be a preparation from the poppy. There is, however, nothing about bûzeh or talar in the Persian, which only specifies sherab, wine or strong drink.

Any medical mixture is called a maajûn; but in common speech the term is chiefly applied to in toxicating comfits, and especially those prepared with bang.

the law; afterwards he became addicted to drinking wine. During nearly forty years that he was King of Khorasan, not a day passed in which he did not drink after mid-day prayers; but he never drank wine in the morning. His sons, the whole of the soldiery, and the town's-people, followed his example in this respect, and seemed to vie with each other in debauchery and lasciviousness. He was a brave and valiant man. He often engaged sword n hand in fight, nay, frequently distinguished his prowess hand to hand several times in the course of the same fight. No person of the race of Taimur Beg ever equalled Sultan Hussain Mirza in the use of the scymitar. He had a turn for poetry, and composed a Diwân. He wrote in the Turki. His poetical name was Hussaini. Many of his verses are far from being bad, but the whole of the Mirza's Diwân is in the same measure. Although a prince of dignity, both as to years and extent of territory, he was as fond as a child of keeping butting rams, and of amusing himself with flying pigeons and cock-fighting." One of the most striking passages in the work is the royal author's account of the magnificence of the court and city of Herat, when he visited it in 1506; and especially his imposing catalogue of the illustrious authors, artists, and men of genius, by whom it was then

"As we were guests at Mozeffer Mirza s house, Mozeffer Mirza placed me above himself, and having filled up a glass of welcome, the cupbearers in waiting began to supply all who were of the party with pure wine, which they quaffed as if it had been the water of life. The party waxed warm, and the spirit mounted up to their heads. They took a fancy to make me drink too, and bring me into the same circle with themselves. Although, all that time, I had never been guilty of drinking wine, and from never having fallen into the practice was ignorant of the sensations it produced, yet I had a strong lurking inclination to wander in this desert, and my heart was much disposed to pass the stream. In my boyhood I had no wish for it, and did not know its pleasures or pains. When my father at any time asked me to drink wine, I excused myself, and abstained. After my father's death, by the guardian care of Khwâjeh Kazi, I remained pure and undefiled. I abstained even from forbidden foods; how then was I likely to indulge in wine? Afterwards when, from the force of youthful imagination and constitutional impulse, I got a desire for wine, I had nobody about my person to invite me to gratify my wishes; nay, there was not one who even suspected my secret longing for it. Though I had the appetite, therefore, it was difficult for me, unsolicited as I was, to indulge such unlawful desires. It now came into my head, that as they urged me so much, and as, besides, I had come into a refined city like "The age of Sultan Hussain Mirza was certainly Heri, in which every means of heightening pleasure a wonderful age; and Khorasan, particularly the and gaiety was possessed in perfection; in which city of Heri, abounded with eminent men of unri- all the incentives and apparatus of enjoyment were valled acquirements, each of whom made it his aim combined with an invitation to indulgence, if I did and ambition to carry to the highest perfection the not seize the present moment, I never could expect art to which he devoted himself. Among these was such another. I therefore resolved to drink wine! the Moulana Abdal Rahman Jàmi,* to whom there But it struck me, that as Badîa-ez-zemân Mirza was no person of that period who could be compar. was the eldest brother, and as I had declined receiv ed, whether in respect to profane or sacred science. ing it from his hand, and in his house, he might now His poems are well known. The merits of the take offence. I therefore mentioned this difficulty Mûlla are of too exalted a nature to admit of being which had occurred to me. My excuse was ap described by me; but I have been anxious to bring proved of, and I was not pressed any more, at this the mention of his name, and an allusion to his ex-party, to drink. It was settled, however, that the cellences, into these humble pages, for a good omen next time we met at Badîa-ez-zemân Mirza's, I and a blessing!" should drink when pressed by the two Mirzas."

adorned.

He then proceeds to enumerate the names of between thirty and forty distinguished per- the conscientious prince escaped from this By some providential accident, however, sons; ranking first the sages and theologians, to the number of eight or nine; next the meditated lapse; and it was not till some poets, about fifteen; then two or three paint-cherished and resisted propensity. At what years after, that he gave way to the longers; and five or six performers and composers of music;-of one of these he gives the following instructive anecdote

"Another was Hussian Udi (the lutanist), who played with great taste on the lute, and composed elegantly. He could play, using only one string of his lute at a time. He had the fault of giving him. self many airs when desired to play. On one occasion Sheibani Khan desired him to play. After giving much trouble he played very ill, and besides, did not bring his own instrument, but one that was good for nothing. Sheibâni Khan, on learning how matters stood, directed that, at that very party, he should receive a certain number of blows on the neck. This was one good deed that Sheibâni Khan did in his day; and indeed the affectation of such people deserves even more severe animadversion."

In the seductions of this luxurious court, Baber's orthodox abhorrence to wine was first assailed with temptation:-and there is something very naïve, we think, in his account of his reasonings and feelings on the occasion.

No moral poet ever had a higher reputation than Jami. His poems are written with great beauty of language and versification, in a captivating strain of religious and philosophie mysticism. He is not merely admired for his sublimity as a poet, but venerated as a saint."

particular occasion he first fell into the snare, unfortunately is not recorded-as there is a blank of several years in the Memoirs previous to 1519. In that year, however, we find him a confirmed toper; and nothing, indeed, can be more ludicrous than the accuracy and apparent truth with which he continues to chronicle all his subsequent and very frequent excesses. The Eastern votary of intoxication has a pleasant way of varying his enjoyments, which was never taken in the West. When the fluid elements of drunkenness begin to pall on him, he betakes him to what is learnedly called a maajun, being a sort of electuary or confection, made up with pleasant spices, and rendered potent by a large admixture of opium, bang, and other narcotic ingredients; producing a solid intoxication of a very delightful and desirable description. One of the first drinking matches that is described makes honourable mention of this variety :

"The maajûn-takers and spirit-drinkers, as they have different tastes, are very apt to take offence with each other. I said, 'Don't spoil the cordiality of the party; whoever wishes to drink spirits, lea

him drink spirits; and let him that prefers maajûn, take maajûn; and let not the one party give any idle or provoking language to the other.' Some sat down to spirits, some to maajûn. The party went on for some time tolerably well. Bâba Jân Kabûzi had not been in the boat; we had sent for him when we reached the royal tents. He chose to drink spirits. Terdi Muhammed Kipchâk, too, was sent for, and joined the spirit-drinkers. As the spiritdrinkers and maajun-takers never can agree in one party, the spirit-bibing party began to indulge in foolish and idle conversation, and to make provok. ing remarks on maajûn and maajûn-takers. Bâba Jan, too, getting drunk, talked very absurdly. The applers, filling up glass after glass for Terdi Muhammed, made him drink them off, so that in a very short time he was mad drunk. Whatever exertions I could make to preserve peace, were all navailing; there was much uproar and wrangling. The party became quite burdensome and unpleasant, and soon broke up."

The second day after, we find the royal oacchanal still more grievously overtaken : "We continued drinking spirits in the boat till bed-time prayers, when, being completely drunk, we mounted, and taking torches in our hands came at full gallop back to the camp from the river-side, falling sometimes on one side of the horse, and sometimes on the other. I was miserably drunk, and next morning, when they told me of our having galloped into the camp with lighted torches in our bands, I had not the slightest recollection of the circumstance. After coming home, I vomited plentifully."

Even in the middle of a harassing and desultory campaign, there is no intermission of this excessive jollity, though it sometimes puts the parties into jeopardy,-for example:

place till bed-time prayers. Mull Mahmud Khalifeh having arrived, we invited him to join us. Abdalla, who had got very drunk, made an observation which affected Khalifeh. Without recollecting that Mulla Mahmud was present, he repeated the verse, (Persian.) Examine whom you will, you will find

him suffering from the same wound.

Mûlly Mahmud, who did not drink, reproved Abdalla for repeating this verse with levity. Abdalla, recovering his judgment, was in terrible perturbation, and conversed in a wonderfully smooth and sweet strain all the rest of the evening."

In a year or two after this, when he seems to be in a course of unusual indulgence, we meet with the following edifying remark: "As I intend, when forty years old, to abstain from wine; and as I now want somewhat less than one year of being forty, I drink wine most copiously!" When forty comes, however, we hear nothing of this sage resolution -but have a regular record of the wine and maajùn parties as before, up to the year 1527. In that year, however, he is seized with rather a sudden fit of penitence, and has the resolution to begin a course of rigorous reform. There is something rather picturesque in his very solemn and remarkable account of this great revolution in his habits:

'On Monday the 23d of the first Jemâdi, I had mounted to survey my posts, and, in the course of my ride, was seriously struck with the reflection that I had always resolved, one time or another, to make an effectual repentance, and that some traces of a hankering after the renunciation of forbidden works had ever remained in my heart. Having sent for the gold and silver goblets and cups, with all the other utensils used for drinking parties, I "We continued at this place drinking till the sun directed them to be broken, and renounced the use was on the decline, when we set out. Those who of wine-purifying my mind! The fragments of had been of the party were completely drunk. the goblets, and other utensils of gold and silver, I Syed Kasim was so drunk, that two of his servants directed to be divided among Derwishes and the were obliged to put him on horseback, and brought poor. The first person who followed me in my rehim to the camp with great difficulty. Dost Mu-pentance was Asas, who also accompanied me in hammed Bakir was so far gone, that Amîn Muhammed Terkhân, Masti Chehreh, and those who were along with him, were unable, with all their exertions, to get him on horseback. They poured a great quantity of water over him, but all to no purpose. At this moment a body of Afghans appeared in sight. Amin Muhammed Terkhân, being very drunk, gravely gave it as his opinion, that rather than leave him, in the condition in which he was, to fall into the hands of the enemy, it was better at once to cut off his head, and carry it away. Making another exertion, however, with much difficulty, they contrived to throw him upon a horse, which they led along, and so brought him off."

On some occasions they contrive to be drunk four times in twenty-four hours. The gallant prince contents himself with a strong maajin one day; but

Next morning we had a drinking party in the same tent. We continued drinking till night. On the following morning we again had an early cup: and, getting intoxicated, went to sleep. About noon-day prayers, we left Istâlîf, and I took a maajun on the road. It was about afternoon prayers before I reached Behzadi. The crops were extremely good. While I was riding round the harvest-fields, such of my companions as were fond of wine began to contrive another drinking bout. Although I had taken a maajûn, yet, as the crops were uncommonly fine! we sat down under some trees that had yielded a plentiful load of fruit, and began to drink. We kept up the party in the same

my resolution of ceasing to cut the beard, and of allowing it to grow. That night and the following, numbers of Amîrs and courtiers, soldiers and persons not in the service, to the number of nearly three hundred men, made vows of reformation. The wine which we had with us we poured on the ground! I ordered that the wine brought by Bâba Dost should have salt thrown into it, that might be make into vinegar. On the spot where the wine had been poured out, I directed a wâîn to be sunk and built of stone, and close by the wâîn an almshouse to be erected."

He then issued a magnificent Firman, announcing his reformation, and recommending its example to all his subjects. But he still persists, we find, in the use of a mild maajùn. We are sorry to be obliged to add, that though he had the firmness to persevere to the last in his abstinence from wine, the sacrifice seems to have cost him very dear; and he continued to the very end of his life to hanker after his broken wine-cups, and to look back with fond regret to the delights he had ab

"This verse, I presume, is from a religious poem, and has a mystical meaning. The profane application of it is the ground of offence."

This vow was sometimes made by persons who set out on a war against the Infidels. They did not trim the beard till they returned victorious. Some vows of a similar nature may be found in Scripture."

jured for ever. There is something abso- | tribution levied on her private fortune. The following brief anecdote speaks volumes as to the difference of European and Asiatic manners and tempers:

lutely pathetic, as well as amiable, in the following candid avowal in a letter written the very year before his death to one of his old drinking companions:

In a letter which I wrote to Abdalla, I mentioned that I had much difficulty in reconciling my. self to the desert of penitence; but that I had resolution enough to persevere,―

(Turki verse)

I am distressed since I renounced wine;
I am confounded and unfit for business,-
Regret leads me to penitence,
Penitence leads me to regret.

“Another of his wives was Katak Begum, who was the foster-sister of this same Terkhân Begum. Sultan Ahmed Mirza married her for love. He was prodigiously attached to her, and she governed him with absolute sway. She drank wine. During her life, the Sultan durst not venture to frequent any other of his ladies. At last, however, he put her to death, and delivered himself from this reproach."

In several of the passages we have cited, there are indications of this ambitious warrior's ardent love for fine flowers, beautiful gardens, and bright waters. But the work abounds with 'traits of this amiable and, with reference to some of these anecdotes, apparently ill-sorted propensity. In one place he

found only in one narrow spot of ground, as we emerge from the straits of Ghûrbend."

And a little after

Indeed, last year, my desire and longing for wine and social parties were beyond measure excessive. It even came to such a length that I have found myself shedding tears from vexation and disappoint ment. In the present year, praise be to God, these troubles are over, and I ascribe them chiefly to the occupation afforded to my mind by a poetical trans-sayslation, on which I have employed myself. Let me advise you too, to adopt a life of abstinence. Social chekin-taleh grass in a very beautiful manner, and "In the warm season they are covered with the parties and wine are pleasant, in company with our the Aimâks and Turks resort to them. In the jolly friends and old boon companions. But with skirts of these mountains the ground is richly diwhom can you enjoy the social cup? With whom versified by various kinds of tulips. I once directed can you indulge in the pleasures of wine? If you them to be counted, and they brought in thirty-two have only Shir Ahmed, and Haîder Kulli, for the or thirty-three different sorts of tulips. There is companions of your gay hours and jovial goblet, one species which has a scent in some degree like you can surely find no great difficulty in consenting the rose, and which I termed laleh-gul-bûi (the roseto the sacrifice. I conclude with every good wish." scented tulip). This species is found only in the We have mentioned already that Baber ap- of ground, and nowhere else. In the skirts of the Desht-e-Sheikh (the Sheikh's plain), in a small spot pears to have been of a frank and generous same hills below Perwan, is produced the lalek-sedcharacter-and there are, throughout the Me-berg (or hundred-leaved tulip), which is likewise moirs, various traits of clemency and tenderness of heart, scarcely to have been expected in an Eastern monarch and professional warrior. He weeps ten whole days for the loss of a friend who fell over a precipice after one of their drinking parties; and spares the lives, and even restores the domains of various chieftains, who had betrayed his confidence, and afterwards fallen into his power. Yet there are traces of Asiatic ferocity, and of a hard-hearted wastefulness of life, which remind us that we are beyond the pale of European gallantry and Christian compassion. In his wars in Afghan and India, the prisoners are commonly butchered in cold blood after the action-and pretty uniformly a triumphal pyramid is erected of their skulls. These horrible executions, too, are performed with much solemnity before the royal pavilion; and on one occasion, it is incidentally recorded, that such was the number of prisoners brought forward for this infamous butchery, that the sovereign's tent had three times to be removed to a different station-the ground before it being so drenched with blood and encumbered with quivering carcasses! On one occasion, and on one only, an attempt was made to poison him-the mother of one of the sovereigns whom he had dethroned having bribed his cooks and tasters to mix death in his repast. Upon the detection of the plot, the taster was cut to pieces, the cook flayed alive, and the scullions trampled to death by elephants. Such, however, was the respect paid to rank, or the indulgence to maternal resentment, that the prime mover of the whole conspiracy, the queen dowager, is merely put under restraint, and has a con

Istâlif. A large river runs through it, and on either "Few quarters possess a district that can rival side of it are gardens, green, gay, and beautiful. Its water is so cold, that there is no need of icing it; and it is particularly pure. In this district is a garden, called Bagh-e-Kilân (or the Great Garden), which Ulugh Beg Mirza seized upon. I paid the price of the garden to the proprietors, and received garden are large and beautiful spreading plane from them a grant of it. On the outside of the trees, under the shade of which there are agreeable spots finely sheltered. A perennial stream, large enough to turn a mill, runs through the garden; and on its banks are planted planes and other trees. Formerly this stream flowed in a winding and tered according to a regular plan, which added greatly to the beauty of the place. Lower down than these villages, and about a koss or a koss and a half above the level plain, on the lower skirts of (Kwajeh three friends), around which there are the hills, is a fountain, named Khwajch-sch-yárân three species of trees; above the fountain are many beautiful plane-trees, which yield a pleasant shade. On the two sides of the fountain, on small entinences at the bottom of the hills, there are a number of oak trees; except on these two spots, where there are groves of oak, there is not an oak to be met with on the hills to the west of Kâbul. In front of this fountain, towards the plain, there are many spots covered with the flowery Arghwân* tree, and besides these Arghwân plots, there are none else in the whole country."

crooked course, but I ordered its course to be al

We shall add but one other notice of this

"The name Arghwan is generally applied to the anemone; but in Afghanistan it is given to a beau tiful flowering shrub, which grows nearly to the size of a tree."