APPENDIX. ly 



about 150 years ago. But this requires the greatest stretch of attention to understand the rules, and of 

 principles, nothing is said. It is surely much to be regretted, that we have no good elementary work of 

 this kind in English : and still more so to find that there is not the least prospect of having one, until 

 some step be taken, either by the Royal Asiatic Society, or some other body capable of bearing the 

 expenses incident to such an undertaking. 



In the next place, what have we in lexicography ? If we except the lexicons of Golius and Castell, we 

 have nothing we can recommend as a general dictionary. Wilmet, indeed, has compiled a very useful 

 work for a few particular books : but then that work is scarce, not to insist on its uselessness in a general 

 way. But this objection will go in a great degree against the lexicons of Golius, Castell, the Kamoos, 

 and the Soorah ; for in these we find scarcely one of the terms of art, without which hardly a single book 

 in Arabic can be made out. Were it necessary here to go into the detail, I could shew, that 

 scarcely a translator is to be named, from Pococke down to the present day, who has not had his labour 

 greatly increased through the omission of technical terms in those dictionaries. This remark extends to 

 every science, to works on theology, and even to the commonest expressions in use among the Arabians. 

 Again, let a man take any book of poetry, or of proverbial expressions, such as the work of Meidani, 

 and try his hand with any of the dictionaries just mentioned. I have no doubt he will make out a sense; 

 but, very likely, a sense quite different from that intended by the author. If Meninski is substituted for 

 these lexicographers, then I believe he would find himself infinitely more bewildered. Here we have 

 nothing to point out the construction of the verbs, the several conjugations in which they are found, or 

 the senses they bear in these conjugations. Many of the words are erroneously explained: and in every 

 case we have a " rudis indigestaque moles." Dr. Wilkins's edition of Richardson's Persian and Arabic 

 dictionary is a very great improvement of that work, but I venture to suggest it would be best to have 

 separate dictionaries of each. That few should be found to understand the Arabic and Persic, with helps 

 like these, is certainly not to be wondered at; the wonder is, how any thing has been made out. The 

 French and German literati have felt this in all its weight, and have very properly betaken themselves 

 to the scholiasts and vocabularies containing the terms of art, and to the native grammarians and 

 commentators on grammar, and hence have found, what they could find no where else, their progress 

 to be solid and delightful. 



In the next place, what can we be said to know of Oriental history, I mean Arabic and Persian, if we 

 except the works of Pococke, Reiske and a few others ? In the Persian, not so much as one historian has 

 yet been printed or translated : and yet our libraries abound with the most valuable works, reserved only 

 for worms'-meat, or to go back into their native element the dust ! The histories of Persia, its dynasties 

 and wars, of Hindustan, of Tartary, and other adjacent countries, are shewn in our libraries, just as 

 " our rarer monsters are,'* merely to excite the surprise of the ignorant. 



Then, of Arabian and Persian poetry, and the belles-lettres, how much do we know ? We have, 

 indeed, a few elegant extracts printed at Calcutta, for which the Honourable East-India Company deserves 

 the thanks of the country,* but how are they to be made out ? Will any one attempt to make out the 



• It is not meant to be averred, that great praise is not due to the Honourable Kast India Company, for the great 

 patronage and support which they have afforded to Oriental literature. To their servants, Europe is entirely 

 indebted for a knowledge of the Sanscrit, and for tlie publication of many valuable works in that language — for a 

 splendid and accurate edition of the Kamoos, the Soorali, the Burhani Katia, the live books on Arabic grammar 

 the Sharho Molla JamI, a valuable edition of the works of Sadi, the Life of Timour, the Makamat of Hauri, the 

 Hidaya, with an English translation, the Deewani Ilatiz, the Dahistani Madhahib, the valuable Persian selections, 

 forming the Class-hooks of the College of Fort "William — all that is known of the Hindustani, a splendid and 

 valuable Cliiriese Dictionary and Grammar, and the translations of some books of History, Tales, and Poetry, with 

 a great variety of other works, iii almost every department* 



