1842.] General Meeting of the Asiatic Society of Paris. 421 



him, and he would have fain entrusted it to Mr. Slane, as it seems 

 to contain the second redaction of that work. 



Mr. Freitag at Bonn, advertises the third volume of his Proverbs of 

 the Arabs ; the two first ones contain the classic work of Meidani, 

 which the third volume will complete, with additional proverbs, not 

 mentioned by this author, and which Mr. Freitag has for the greater 

 part taken from an unedited work of Scherefeddin, and from the pro- 

 verbs of the Bedooins by Mr. Burckhard. The work will be closed by 

 very copious tables of contents, to enable the reader to find the pro- 

 verbs which the Arabian authors often indicate by a single word. 



Mr. Sprenger, under auspices of the Committee of Translations, has 

 edited the first volume of his English translation of the celebrated work of 

 Masoudi, " The Meadows of Gold." 14 Masoudi wrote in times most fa- 

 vourable for a historian ; the Khalifat in the beginning of the 4th cen- 

 tury of the Hegira had obtained almost its largest extension, the in- 

 tellect of the Arabs was not yet put down by the grammar, the 

 rhetoric, and the controversies of the sects, their genius was still stimu- 

 lated by the remains of the ancient civilisation, and by the literature of 

 the conquered nations, and the position of the Khalifat facilitated the most 

 distant travels. Masoudi availed himself of all these advantages ; his read- 

 ing was immense, his travels uninterrupted, and very extensive. Accord- 

 ing to the custom of the learned men of his time, he has written on almost 

 all subjects which then could interest Musulman readers ; but for us his 

 historical -works alone are of interest. The first of his compositions is 

 Akhbar-al-Zeman, an enormous work of at least twenty volumes ; the 

 second is the Kitab-al-Aouscth, being the complement to the Akhbar ; 

 and the third, the " Meadows of Gold," forming at the same time the 

 extract and the supplement of the two others. This last work alone is 

 known in Europe. Written with a singular want of order and method, 

 it contains the most curious information on a great number of subjects. 

 Not being a mere compiler, as are most of Oriental historians, Masoudi 

 made a great many personal observations and researches on subjects 

 neglected by his predecessors. Mr. Sprenger has compared for his 

 translation the manuscripts of Leyden, Paris, and London, and always 

 added the Arabian orthography of the names, which is of great assistance 



14. El Masudi's Historical Encyclopedia, entitled Meadows of Gold and Mines of 

 Gems, translated by Aloys Sprenger, vol. i. London, in 8vo. 



