106 Baddoni and his Works. [No. 3, 



where the MSS. which were used by the editors, still exist. In some 

 works the geographical difficulties are so great, that they could not 

 be well overcome by a translator in England ; in others the allusions 

 are so pointed that without some familiarity with the people, and some 

 instruction and assistance from good native teachers, it would be 

 almost impossible to write a faithful translation. Not all our works 

 are as easy in style as the Iqbdlndmah, the Pddishdhndmah, or 

 Sayyid Ahmad's edition of the Tuzuk-i-Jahdngiri, which works any 

 one who has made fair progress in Persian could translate. The texts 

 of these works, moreover, are in a satisfactory condition. 



It was therefore with much pleasure that the Society lately learned 

 that two of its members, Mr. T. W. H. Tolbort, and Mr. C. J.. 

 Lyall, are about to entrust to the Society their MS. translations and 

 abstracts of the Tdr'ikh-i-Firuzslidlu, and the reign of Akbar by 

 Nizam i-Harawi. 



For the present paper I have selected the work known as the Tdrikh- 

 i-Baddoni, partly because I found a perusal of the work of great assist- 

 ance for my critical edition of the Ain, partly because of all Indian 

 Historians Badaoni is the most difficult to be understood ; and I take 

 this opportunity to acknowledge the obligations under which I lie to 

 the Joint-Editor, Maulawi A'gha Ahmad 'Ali, for the assistance I 

 received from him in preparing a MS. translation of Akbar's Reign (the 

 second volume of Badaoni), from which some of the extracts below 

 are taken. Badaoni is the only author among our Historians, to 

 the peculiarities of whose character and opinions it is possible 

 to trace the plan and the execution of his work. The opinion 

 now current regarding Badaoni — which opinion is also held by 

 a recent writer on Indian Historians in the Journal of the 

 E. A. Society of Great Britain for 1868— is that the value of Ba- 

 daoni's work lies in its giving us a view of the character of the great 

 Emperor from an opposite point ; secondly, that he was a bigoted 

 Moslem ; thirdly, that he could not tolerate the extremes of toleration 

 to which Abulfazl and Faizi allowed the Emperor to go ; fourthly 

 that the bitterness of the author impaired his judgment ; fifthly, that 

 his work when read by itself does injustice to Akbar ; sixthly, that 

 he writes " in unmeasured terms" of Akbar; and seventhly, that "his 

 work may even give a very erroneous impression of the character, and 



