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Page 172.

As a native of Cashmere, which had in the same manner become the prey of strangers.

"Cashmere (say its historians) had its own Princes 4000 years before its conquest by Akbar in 1585. Akbar would have found some difficulty to reduce this Paradise of the Indies, situated as it is, within such a fortress of mountains, but its monarch, Yusef-Khan, was basely betrayed by his Omrahs." Pennant.

Page 173.

His story of the Fire-worshippers.

Voltaire tells us that in his Tragedy "Les Guebres," he was generally supposed to have alluded to the Jansenists; and I should not be surprised if this story of the Fire-worshippers were found capable of a similar doubleness of application.

Page 180.

Who, lull'd in cool kiosk or bower.

"In the midst of the garden is the chiosk, that is, a large room, commonly beautified with a fine fountain in the midst of it. It is raised nine or ten steps, and inclosed with gilded lattices, round which vines, jessamines, and honey-suckles, make a sort of green wall: large trees are planted round this place, which is the scene of their greatest pleasures.” Lady M. W. Montagu.

Page 180.

Before their mirrors count the time.

The women of the East are never without their looking

glasses. "In Barbary," says Shaw," they are so fond of their looking-glasses, which they hang upon their breasts, that they will not lay them aside, even when, after the drudgery of the day, they are obliged to go two or three miles with a pitcher or a goat's skin to fetch water." Travels.

In other parts of Asia they wear little looking-glasses on their thumbs. "Hence (and from the lotus being considered the emblem of beauty) is the meaning of the following mute intercourse of two lovers before their parents.

He with salute of deference due

A lotus to his forehead prest;

She rais'd her mirror to his view,

Then turn'd it inward to her breast.'"

Page 182.

Asiatic Miscellany, vol. ii.

th' untrodden solitude

Of Ararat's tremendous peak.

Struy says, "I can well assure the reader that their opinion is not true, who suppose this mount to be inaccessible." He adds that "the lower part of the mountain is cloudy, misty, and dark, the middlemost part very cold and like clouds of snow, but the upper regions perfectly calm." It was on this mountain that the Ark was supposed to have rested after the Deluge, and part of it they say exists there still, which Struy thus gravely accounts for: "Whereas none can remember that the air on the top of the hill did ever change or was subject either to wind or rain, which is presumed to be the reason that the Ark has endured so long without being rotten."

v. Car

reri's Travels, where the Doctor laughs at this whole account of Mount Ararat.

Page 191.

The Gheber belt that round him clung.

"Pour se distinguer des Idolatres de l'Inde, les Guebres se ceignent tous d'un cordon de laine, ou de poil de chameau." Encyclopédie Françoise.

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D'Herbelot says this belt was generally of leather.

Page 192.

Who morn and even

Hail their Creator's dwelling-place

Among the living lights of Heaven.

"As to fire, the Ghebers place the spring-head of it in that globe of fire, the Sun, by them called Mythras, or Mihir, to which they pay the highest reverence, in gratitude for the manifold benefits flowing from its ministerial omniscience. But they are so far from confounding the subordination of the Servant with the majesty of its Creator, that they not only attribute no sort of sense or reasoning to the sun or fire, in any of its operations, but consider it as a purely passive blind instrument, directed and governed by the immediate impression on it of the will of God; but they do not even give that luminary, all glorious as it is, more than the second rank amongst his works, reserving the first for that stupendous production of divine power, the mind of man."- Grose. The false charges brought against the religion of these people by their Mussulman tyrants is but one proof among many of the truth of this writer's remark, that "calumny is often added to oppression, if but for the sake of justifying it."

Page 197.

That tree which grows over the tomb of the musician

Tan-Sein.

"Within the enclosure which surrounds this monument (at Gualior) is a small tomb to the memory of Tan-Sein, a musician of incomparable skill, who flourished at the court of Akbar. The tomb is over-shadowed by a tree, concerning which a superstitious notion prevails, that the chewing of its leaves will give an extraordinary melody to the voice." - Narrative of a Journey from Agra to Ouzein, by W. Hunter, Esq.

Page 197.

The awful signal of the bamboo-staff.

"It is usual to place a small white triangular flag, fixed to a bamboo staff of ten or twelve feet long, at the place where a tiger has destroyed a man. It is common for the passengers also to throw each a stone or brick near the spot, so that in the course of a little time a pile equal to a good waggon-load is collected. The sight of these flags and piles of stones imparts a certain melancholy, not perhaps altogether void of apprehension."— Oriental Field Sports, vol. ii.

Page 198.

Beneath the shade some pious hands had erected, &c. "The Ficus Indica is called the Pagod Tree and Tree of Councils; the first from the idols placed under its shade; the second, because meetings were held under its cool branches. In some places it is believed to be the haunt of spectres, as the ancient spreading oaks of Wales have been

of fairies; in others are erected beneath the shade pillars of stone, or posts, elegantly carved and ornamented with the most beautiful porcelain to supply the use of mirrors."

Pennant.

Page 200.

The nightingale now bends her flight.

"The nightingale sings from the pomegranate-groves in the day-time, and from the loftiest trees at night."- Russel's Aleppo.

Page 204.

Before whose sabre's dazzling light, &c.

"When the bright cimitars make the eyes of our heroes wink." The Moallakat, Poem of Amru.

Page 204.

As Lebanon's small mountain-flood

Is rendered holy by the ranks

Of sainted cedars on its banks.

In the Lettres Edifiantes, there is a different cause assigned for its name of Holy." In these are deep caverns, which formerly served as so many cells for a great number of recluses, who had chosen these retreats as the only witnesses upon earth of the severity of their penance. tears of these pious penitents gave the river of which we have just treated the name of the Holy River." v. Chateaubriand's Beauties of Christianity...

Page 208,

A rocky mountain o'er the sea

Of Oman beetling awfully.

The

This mountain is my own creation, as the " stupendous

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