580 Some account of the " Kaldn Mmjeed" [June, 



door, and the pillars of the doorways and of the arches, are constructed 

 of square roughly-hewn, hard, grey stone, described by Capt. Cautley, 

 as only a variety of the quartzose sandstone more commonly in use 

 in the walls, &c. which is also used for the eaves (slabs not above two 

 inches thick and about two feet square) projecting into the upper inner 

 square or court of the mosque, and for the brackets which support 

 them. These brackets as well as the pillars at the doorways, are 

 carved, as shown in the annexed sketches. Under the eaves, and 

 resting on the brackets, is a ledge of the Roopas red stone, now so 

 commonly in use throughout these provinces, but which seems to have 

 been much more sparingly employed about the time of Feeroz than it 

 was 80 or a hundred years before, in the Kootub Meenar, the Mote 

 Musjeed, and other structures of the time of Shahab-ood-deen and 

 Shums-ood-deen Altumsh. The red stone is also used, (on account, 

 presumeably, of its being softer and therefore more easily carved,) in 

 the lattices of the windows, which are still open, and probably orna- 

 mented all the thirty-three windows which surrounded the upper story, 

 some of which are now blocked up with the common stone masonry. 

 There are also lattices of the same material between the main body of 

 the mosque, and the vaulted passage leading on each side to the dark 

 apartments behind, but none to the west. These lattices appear, 

 notwithstanding their having been very well carved, to have been all 

 covered with very fine chunam, after the fashion which prevailed to 

 within the last hundred years, when the finely carved pillars, such as 

 are standing in the ruins of the Koodseea Begum's Palace, built by the 

 mother of Mahomed Shah (outside the Kashmeer gate) were similarly 

 plastered over, to hide, it would seem, the piecings which here and 

 there occur in the stone work. The stairs leading from below to the 

 upper or main story are a flight of 29 steps, built upon three blind 

 arches, with a landing place, and two more steps leading into the 

 vestibule. Over the doorway, as exhibited in the sketch of the eleva- 

 tion, is a slab of somewhat rudely polished marble, with an inscription 

 in the Nuskh character, of which the following is a copy in the common 

 character of the present day : — 



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