100 Proceedings of the Asiatic Sociei 'y. [June, 



T. W. H. Tolbort, Esq., C. S. Mozufferghur, proposed by Dr. T. 

 Anderson, seconded by Mr. H. F. Blanford. 



Major J. Morland proposed by J. G-eoghegan, Esq., seconded by 

 Mr. H. F. Blanford. 



Lieut. W. C. Ramsden, 30th P. N. I., Jnlpygorie, proposed by Capt. 

 H. H. G. Austen, seconded by Mr. Heeley. 



Br. C. F. Tonnerre proposed by Mr. Grote, seconded by Babu Rajen- 

 dralala Mitra. 



Dr. Fawcus proposed by Capt. Lees, seconded by Mr. Grote. 



Br. David Boyes Smith proposed by Dr. J. Fayrer, seconded by 

 Mr. H. F. Blanford. 



The receipt of the following communications was announced : — 



1. From Babu Gopeenath Sen, abstracts of the Meteorological 

 Observations kept at the Surveyor General's Office, for the month of 

 February last. 



2. From Professor Biihler, through W. Stokes, Esq., a translation 

 of the part of the Vyavahara Mayukha relating to ordeals. 



Capt. Lees read a letter from Dr. Sprenger prefaced by the follow- 

 ing remarks. 



" It will be in the recollection of some here present this evening, that 

 in the year 1854, I edited, in the Bibliotheca Indica, a history of the 

 Mohammadan conquests in Syria, under the successors of Mohammad, 

 by a very early writer named Abu Isma'il al-Azdi. The single MS. 

 upon which this text was founded, was old, worm-eaten, and dilapidated, 

 but it was believed to be unique. It was found by the learned Dr. 

 Aloys Sprenger of Calcutta at Delhi, in 1850, as he was rummaging 

 among the remnants of a library belonging to an old spiritual teacher 

 of the last of the Great Moguls. Prior to the publication of this 

 work, this interesting period of Mohammadan history was known to" 

 the European reader solely through the medium of the book ascribed 

 to the well-known Arabian author Waqidy, and once believed to he 

 genuine, but which is now commonly called the pseudo- Waqidy. 

 On this work the simple Ockley based his history of the Saracens, and 

 it was Ockley's history which furnished the distinguished American, 

 Washington Irving with the substance of the stirring narrative he 

 has given us of the Moslim conquests of Syria, under the title of the 

 11 Successors of Mohammad." Considering the great importance of 



