Page:Fables and Proverbs from the Sanskrit, being the Hitopadesa.djvu/15

 TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 11

thus : &quot; The ancient Brahmins of India, after a great deal of time and labour, compiled a treatise (which they called Kurtuk Dumnik*) in which were inserted the choicest treasures of wisdom, and the perfectest rules for governing a people. This book they presented to their Rajahs, who kept it with the greatest secrecy and care. About the time of Mahommed s birth, or the latter end of the sixth century, Noishervan the Just, who then reigned in Persia, discovered a great inclination to see that book : for which purpose one Burzuvia, a physician, who had a surprising talent in learning several languages, particularly the Sanskrit, was introduced to him as the properest person to be employed to get a copy thereof. He went to India ; where, after some years stay, and great trouble, he procured it. It was trans lated into the Pehluvi language by him, and Buzr- jumehr the Vizier. Noi-hervan ever after, and all his successors, the Persian kings, had this book in high esteem, and took the greatest care to keep it secret. At last Abu Jaffer Mansour zu Nikky, who was the second Khaliff of the Abassi reign, by great search got a copy thereof in the Pehluvi language, and ordered Iman Hossan Abdal MokafTa, who was the most learned of the age, to translate it into Arabic. This prince ever after made it his guide,


 * The Karattaka and Damannka of the following work.