Page:The Tarikh-i-Rashidi - Mirza Muhammad Haidar, Dughlát - tr. Edward D. Ross (1895).djvu/33

6 parenthetically—by way of declamation—and thus only interrupts the course of the narrative, while not marring its sense. His sentences, again, are often involved and his meaning not always apparent. This is more especially the case where he uses the ratio obliqua, and where he puts speeches into the mouths of his characters; but when he confines himself to the direct relation of an event, such as the siege of Yangi-Hisar or the battle of Kanauj, his descriptive power is excellent, and the picture he presents is all that can be desired. On the whole, it may be said that for an author who takes credit to himself (as the Mirza does in his prologue) for being a past master in the art of making verses and in the "epistolary style," his writing is not obscure as Asiatic writings go; and though rather tedious repetitions are found in some of the historical sections, this is a fault on the right side, and causes less embarrassment than when gaps occur in the narrative.

These points relate more particularly to the author's style, but the chief imperfections in the work lie deeper. Perhaps those most to be deplored, are the weakness of the chronology and the looseness with which numbers and measurements are used. The former is a serious blemish, but as it is most marked in the early parts of the history, where the faults can be, to some extent rectified, by references to Chinese and other annals, it is not of vital consequence. A great part of his information haying reached him by means of verbal tradition, passed down through three or four generations, the dates, above all, would tend to suffer; while, generally, it may be supposed that Mirza Haidar had scarcely realised, as did Sir Walter Scott, that "tradition is as frequently an inventor of fiction, as a preserver of truth." The second defect is greatly to be regretted, as many interesting passages relating to military operations, the tribes, cities, ruins and curiosities are greatly diminished in value, from the want of accuracy in the figures recorded. The tendency, generally, it to exaggerate freely. A third, but less important deficiency, is the one partially alluded to above—i.e., the want of systematic arrangement into divisions, or sections, the absence of which is the cause of the frequent repetitions that occur, and the involution of one subject with another.

The scope and character of the Tarikh-i-Rashidi may be briefly summarised in much the same way as Dr. Charles Rieu, the learned Keeper of the Oriental Manuscripts at the British