Of Ferdoosee. 13 
erected, and was told that it was built by or- 
der of Mahmood, with the money which 
the daugliter of the poet had refused. (7) 
Eien hundred years have now elapsed 
since the publication of Ferdoosee’s great 
work, and it still continues to receive in the 
East that admiration with which it was hail’d 
on its first appearance. Whatever indeed be 
the opinion which European readers may 
form of it, the Shah-nameh is confessedly the 
noblest production of Eastern genius, and 
the applause which has been bestowed upon 
it, by some liberal and enlightened critics of 
the Western world, may incline us to believe, 
that all its merit does not depend upon mere 
(7) It is proper to state that some of the circumstances mentioned 
in the preceding narrative are taken from a MS. account of the life 
ef Ferdoosee, which is prefixed to almost all the copies of his Shah- 
nameh, It forms a part of the preface to the corrected edition of the 
Shah-nameh, made by the order of Bayasungher Khan, one of the 
descendents of the Emperor Timour, and published in the year of the 
Hejira 829 (A. D. 1425--6.) and may be supposed therefore to contain 
all that was then known of the poet; but as it is the only detailed 
account of his life with which I am acquainted, I have no means of 
ascertaining its perfect authenticity. 
