1868.] Proceedings of tlie Asiatic Society. 143 



Mahomedans. Some information of their country, more especially 

 in regard to routes, obtained after much difficulty of communication 

 with them, has already been published in the ( Daily News' paper of the 

 25th ultimo. I am happy to be able to add some more to the stock, 

 and to introduce a couple of our distant and interesting visitors 

 to this meeting, for ocular observation and personal enquiry as to 

 any facts. From what I could learn, Arabic learning, as befits a 

 Mahomedan country, nourishes well in Mussulman China, much 

 'encouragement being given to its cultivation, by means of numerous 

 colleges, and by rewards to learned men for studying the mass of 

 Arabic literature, which has found its way there. 



One of our visitors, named Si/ud Ahdool Wudood, appears to be 

 a learned man, and as he is not at all disinclined to impart informa- 

 tion, his presence in Calcutta, would have been really valuable, had 

 it not been for . his almost unintelligible pronunciation of Arabic. 

 He writes, however, Arabic fluently and well, and he has in his pos- 

 session an account in Arabic of the Mahomedans in China, giving a 

 brief narrative of the political events that have taken place in 

 Yunnan during the last thirteen years. It is not such an account as will 

 satisfy all the demands of European enquiry, but for an oriental docu- 

 ment, it is singularly clear. What gaps there are may be filled up 

 by fresh questioning. I have made a copy of the account, which 

 I beg to present to the Society, and I will now read a translation 

 of it. 



1 In the year 1254 Hegira (1839 of the Christian era) a distur- 

 bance took place in a district of the Province of Yunnan ; the par- 

 ticulars of which are, that the Infidels burnt down several villages 

 1 of the Mahomedans to ashes and massacred their inhabitants, killing 

 Mahomedans, men and women, to the number of 2000 or more. 

 The survivors preferred their complaints before the higher local 

 authorities, but no one paid even the slightest attention to them, 

 and on the contrary they charged these very persons with being 

 blameable and guilty. They then repaired to Pekin, and laid their 

 grievances before His Majesty the Emperor of China — who deputed 

 one of the higher Officers of the Court to Yunnan, in order to do 

 justice. When this Officer arrived there, he perverted the royal com- 

 i mands, and proceeded to act just as he was instructed by his prede- 



