JOURNAL 



OF THE 



ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



No. I.— 1852. 



A Tale by Inshct Allah Khan. Communicated and translated by 

 L. Clint, Esq., Principal of La Martiniere College, Luc/cnow. 



The tale submitted to the Society was placed in my hands by Dr. 

 Sprenger for publication and translation, in consequence of his not 

 being able from want of time to perform the task himself. Before he 

 became aware that he would not be able to fulfil his intentions, he had 

 drawn up the following notice of the subject, which, with his permis- 

 sion, I introduce. 



" The Biography of this poet is in Garcin de Tassy's excellent His- 

 toire de la Literature Hindoustanie. He flourished in the beginning 

 of this century at Lucknow. Besides this tale, a masnawy, and some 

 minor compositions, he left a dywan, which is in our library, and he is 

 the author of a great portion of the Daryae Latafat, which has lately 

 been printed at Murshidabad." 



" I found a copy of this Tale in the Moty Ma^all library at Lucknow 

 and had it transcribed. Its value consists in a peculiarity of style ; 

 though pure and elegant Urdoo and fully intelligible even to the 

 Musalmans of the Court of Dehlee or Lucknow, it does not contain 

 one Persian word, whereas the language usually spoken by fashionable 

 persons in these two cities is almost purely Persian. In Lucknow 

 in particular the Hindee words are very sparingly used. This is much 

 to be regretted, because the people of the villages and even the Hin- 

 dus in the city who are neither directly nor indirectly connected with 



No. LI. — New Series. b 



