9/2 Account of the Town and Palace of Feerozabad. [Sept. 



were swayed by some momentary whim engendered by local circum- 

 stances, of which few records are in existence. 



In some of these towns and forts were displayed all the architectural 

 beauties that time, which unlimited resources, and the particular taste of 

 each sovereign allowed of his indulging in ; and the most expensive mate- 

 rials were brought from a great distance at a vast cost, to give them 

 the most gorgeous appearance ; while other structures were raised in the 

 most massive, but at the same time, rude style, the result probably of 

 the pressing necessities of the times, especially the frequent and dis- 

 tant wars in which most of the sovereigns of Dehli were continually 

 engaged, and which left them little time for the cultivation of the arts 

 of peace. In these were used the coarse materials on the spot, and the 

 monuments of the glory of former kings were frequently destroyed to 

 save the trouble of quarrying new stone. For in this manner alone 

 can we account for the comparatively few remnants we find at the pre- 

 sent day of the massive battlements that must have surrounded several 

 at least of the towns of Delhi in succession, or of the huge piles of 

 buildings that must have been reared within their walls.* 



There are nevertheless numerous historical proofs, supported, not- 

 withstanding the extensive devastation to be traced in many directions, 

 by local evidence of the most convincing character, that the several 

 towns, built from time to time, in the neighbourhood of the present 

 Delhi, cannot have been less than thirteen, while tradition, which may, 

 on investigation, turn out partially correct, adds some three or four more 

 to the number. Of the extreme desirableness, in an archaeological point 

 of view of fixing the locality of these several towns and forts, and of 

 the value attaching, in a historical point, to researches, which shall 

 identify these localities, with the names that occur in the records of the 

 times, there can, it is presumed, be very little doubt. The historians of 

 the Indo-Mahometan middle ages have placed many of those names on 

 record. They have, in several instances, described the relative positions 



* Seree, Jehanpunnah and Old Dehli, must, at the time of the invasion of' I'aimoor, 

 have occupied a space at least seven miles in length, by some three or four in breadth. 

 The three towns had thirty gates opening to the country or into one another. We hope 

 some day to give an accurate outline of these cities. It is not to be wondered that Saiud 

 Moobarik found it necessary to build another town soon after Taimoor's invasion ; he 

 must have left Old Dehli almost a heap of ruins.— H. C— II. L. 



