PREFACE. 
This volume being the commencement of a new 
series, I am anxious to say a few words with refer- 
ence to the motive which directed my present choice. 
Little is commonly known of the Mohammedan history 
of India, and this because the means of information 
are not readily accessible to the general reader. It 
therefore occurred to me, that a series of volumes em- 
bracing a portion of history with which, though ex- 
tremely interesting, the large majority of persons are 
not familiar, would be opening a new source of know- 
ledge, agreeable to many in search of information as 
well as amusement. 
The volumes of the Oriental Annual already pub- 
lished are better calculated, upon the whole, to amuse 
than instruct ; at the same time, they were intended 
to convey that sort of instruction to be derived from an 
