Note 91,  p. 67.—Here fond Zuleika woos with open arms.

The wife of Potiphar, thus named by the Orientals.

“The passion which this frail beauty of antiquity conceived for her young Hebrew slave has given rise to a much-esteemed poem in the Persian language, entitled Yusef vau Zelikha, by Noureddin Jami; the manuscript copy of which, in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, is supposed to be the finest in the whole world.”—Note upon Nott’s Translation of Hafez.

Note 92,  p. 67.—With a new text to consecrate their love.

The particulars of Mahomet’s amour with Mary, the Coptic girl, in justification of which he added a new chapter to the Koran, may be found in Gagnier’s Notes upon Abulfeda, p. 151.

Note 93,  p. 70.—But in that deep-blue, melancholy dress.

“Deep blue is their mourning colour.”—Hanway.

Note 94,  p. 71.—Sat in her sorrow like the sweet night-flower.

The sorrowful nyctanthes, which begins to spread its rich odour after sunset.

Note 95,  p. 73.—As the viper weaves its wily covering.

“Concerning the vipers, which Pliny says were frequent among the balsam-trees, I made very particular inquiry: several were brought me alive both to Yambo and Jidda.”—Bruce.

Note 96,  p. 81.—The sunny apples of Istkahar.—“In the territory of Istkahar there is a kind of apple, half of which is sweet and half sour.”—Ebn Haukal.

Note 97,  p. 82.—They saw a young Hindoo girl upon the bank.—For an account of this ceremony, see Grandpré’s Voyage in the Indian Ocean.

Note 98,  p. 82.—The Oton-tala, or Sea of Stars.—“The place where the Whangho, a river of Tibet, rises, and where there are more than a hundred springs, which sparkle like stars; whence it is called Hotun-nor, that is, the Sea of Stars.”—Description of Tibet in Pinkerton.

Note 99,  p. 84.—Hath sprung up here.

“The Lescar or Imperial Camp is divided, like a regular town, into squares, alleys, and streets, and from a rising ground furnishes one of the most agreeable prospects in the world. Starting up in a few hours in an uninhabited plain, it raises the idea of a city built by enchantment. Even those who leave their houses in cities to follow the prince in his progress are frequently so charmed by the Lescar, when situated in a beautiful and convenient place, that they cannot prevail with themselves to remove. To prevent this inconvenience to the court, the Emperor, after sufficient time is allowed to the tradesmen to follow, orders them to be burnt out of their tents.”—Dow’s Hindostan.

Colonel Wilks gives a lively picture of an Eastern encampment:—“His camp, like that of most Indian armies, exhibited a motley collection of covers from the scorching sun and dews of the night, variegated according to the taste or means of each individual, by extensive inclosures of coloured calico surrounding superb suites of tents; by ragged cloths or blankets stretched over sticks or branches; palm leaves hastily spread over similar supports; handsome tents and splendid canopies; horses, oxen, elephants, and camels; all intermixed without any exterior mark of order or design, except the flags of the chiefs, which usually mark the centres of a congeries of these masses; the only regular part of the encampment being the streets of shops, each of which is constructed nearly in the manner of a booth at an English fair.”—Historical Sketches of the South of India.

Note 100,  p. 84.—Built the high pillar’d halls of Chilminar.

The edifices of Chilminar and Balbec are supposed to have been built by the Genii, acting under the orders of Jan ben Jan, who governed the world long before the time of Adam.

Note 101,  p. 85.—And camels, tufted o’er with Yemen’s shells.

“A superb camel, ornamented with strings and tufts of small shells.”—Ali Bey.

Note 102,  p. 85.—But the far torrent, or the locust bird.

A native of Khorassan, and allured southward by means of the water of a fountain between Shiraz and Ispahan, called the Fountain of Birds, of which it is so fond that it will follow wherever that water is carried.

Note 103,  p. 85.—Of laden camels and their drivers’ songs.

“Some of the camels have bells about their necks, and some about their legs, like those which our carriers put about their forehorses’ necks, which together with the servants (who belong to the camels, and travel on foot), singing all night, make a pleasant noise, and the journey passes away delightfully.”—Pitt’s Account of the Mahometans.

“The camel-driver follows the camels singing, and sometimes playing upon his pipe; the louder he sings and pipes, the faster the camels go. Nay, they will stand still when he gives over his music.”—Tavernier.

Note 104,  p. 85.—Of the’ Abyssinian trumpet, swell and float.

“This trumpet is often called, in Abyssinia, nesser cano, which signifies the Note of the Eagle.”—Note of Bruce’s Editor.

Note 105,  p. 85.—The Night and Shadow, over yonder tent.

The two black standards borne before the Caliphs of the House of Abbas were called, allegorically, The Night and The Shadow.—See Gibbon.

Note 106,  p. 86.—Defiance fierce at Islam.—The Mahometan religion.

Note 107,  p. 86.—But, having sworn upon the Holy Grave.

“The Persians swear by the tomb of Shah Besade, who is buried at Casbin; and when one desires another to asseverate a matter, he will ask him, if he dare swear by the Holy Grave.”—Struy.

Note 108,  p. 86.—Were spoil’d to feed the Pilgrim’s luxury.

Mahadi, in a single pilgrimage to Mecca, expended six millions of dinars of gold.

Note 109,  p. 86.—Of Mecca’s sun, with urns of Persian snow.

“Nivem Meccam apportavit, rem ibi aut nunquam aut raro visam.”—Abulfeda.

Note 110,  p. 86.—First, in the van, the People of the Rock.

The inhabitants of Hejaz or Arabia Petræa, called by an Eastern writer “The People of the Rock.”—See Ebn Haukal.

Note 111,  p. 86.—On their light mountain steeds, of royal stock.

“Those horses, called by the Arabians Kochlani, of whom a written genealogy has been kept for 2,000 years. They are said to derive their origin from King Solomon’s steeds.”—Niebuhr.

Note 112,  p. 87.—The flashing of their swords’ rich marquetry.

“Many of the figures on the blades of their swords are wrought in gold or silver, or in marquetry with small gems.”—Asiat. Misc. v. i.

Note 113,  p. 87.—With dusky legions from the land of Myrrh.

Azab or Saba.

Note 114,  p. 87.—Waving their heron crests with martial grace.

“The chiefs of the Uzbek Tartars wear a plume of white heron’s feathers in their turbans.”—Account of Independent Tartary.

Note 115,  p. 87.—Wild warriors of the turquoise hills.

“In the mountains of Nishapour and Tous (in Khorassan) they find turquoises.”—Ebn Haukal.

Note 116,  p. 87.—Of Hindoo Kosh, in stormy freedom bred.

For a description of these stupendous ranges of mountains, see Elphinstone’s Caubul.

Note 117,  p. 88.—Her Worshippers of Fire.

The Ghebers or Guebres, those original natives of Persia, who adhered to their ancient faith, the religion of Zoroaster, and who, after the conquest of their country by the Arabs, were either persecuted at home, or forced to become wanderers abroad.

Note 118,  p. 88.—From Yezd’s eternal Mansion of the Fire.

“Yezd, the chief residence of those ancient natives, who worship the Sun and the Fire, which latter they have carefully kept lighted, without being once extinguished for a moment, about 3,000 years, on a mountain near Yezd, called Ater Quedah, signifying the House or Mansion of the Fire. He is reckoned very unfortunate who dies off that mountain.”—Stephen’s Persia.

Note 119,  p. 88.—That burn into the Caspian, fierce they came.

“When the weather is hazy, the springs of Naphtha (on an island near Baku) boil up the higher, and the Naphtha often takes fire on the surface of the earth, and runs in a flame into the sea to a distance almost incredible.”—Hanway on the Everlasting Fire at Baku.

Note 120,  p. 88.—By which the prostrate Caravan is aw’d.

Savary says of the south wind, which blows in Egypt from February to May, “Sometimes it appears only in the shape of an impetuous whirlwind, which passes rapidly, and is fatal to the traveller surprised in the middle of the deserts. Torrents of burning sand roll before it, the firmament is enveloped in a thick veil, and the sun appears of the colour of blood. Sometimes whole caravans are buried in it.”

Note 121,  p. 89.—The Champions of the Faith through Beder’s vale.

In the great victory gained by Mahomed at Beder, he was assisted, say the Mussulmans, by three thousand angels, led by Gabriel, mounted on his horse Hiazum.—See The Koran and its Commentators.

Note 122,  p. 92.—“Alla Akbar!”

The Tecbir, or cry of the Arabs. “Alla Acbar!” says Ockley, means “God is most mighty.”

Note 123,  p. 92.—And light your shrines and chaunt your ziraleets.

The ziraleet is a kind of chorus, which the women of the East sing upon joyful occasions.—Russel.

Note 124,  p. 92.—Or warm or brighten,—like that Syrian Lake.

The Dead Sea, which contains neither animal nor vegetable life.

Note 125,  p. 95.—O’er his lost throne—then pass’d the Jihon’s flood.

The ancient Oxus.

Note 126,  p. 95.—Rais’d the white banner within Neksheb’s gates.

A city of Transoxiana.

Note 127,  p. 95.—To-day’s young flower is springing in its stead.

“You never can cast your eyes on this tree, but you meet there either blossoms or fruit; and as the blossom drops underneath on the ground (which is frequently covered with these purple-coloured flowers), others come forth in their stead,” &c. &c.—Nieuhoff.

Note 128,  p. 96.—With which the Dives have gifted him.

The Demons of the Persian mythology.

Note 129,  p. 96.—That spangle India’s fields on showery nights.

Carreri mentions the fire-flies in India during the rainy season.—See his Travels.

Note 130,  p. 96.—Who brush’d the thousands of the’ Assyrian King.

Sennacherib, called by the Orientals King of Moussal.—D’Herbelot.

Note 131,  p. 97.—Of Parviz.

Chosroes. For the description of his Throne or Palace, see Gibbon and D’Herbelot.

There were said to be under this Throne or Palace of Khosrou Parviz a hundred vaults filled with “treasures so immense that some Mahometan writers tell us, their Prophet, to encourage his disciples, carried them to a rock, which at his command opened, and gave them a prospect through it of the treasures of Khosrou.”—Universal History.

Note 132,  p. 97.—And the heron crest that shone.

“The crown of Gerashid is cloudy and tarnished before the heron tuft of thy turban.”—From one of the elegies or songs in praise of Ali, written in characters of gold round the gallery of Abbas’s tomb.—See Chardin.

Note 133,  p. 97.—Magnificent, o’er Ali’s beauteous eyes.

The beauty of Ali’s eyes was so remarkable, that whenever the Persians would describe any thing as very lovely, they say it is Ayn Hali, or the Eyes of Ali.—Chardin.

Note 134,  p. 98.—Rise from the Holy Well, and cast its light.

We are not told more of this trick of the Impostor, than that it was “une machine, qu’il disoit être la Lune.” According to Richardson, the miracle is perpetuated in Nekscheb.—“Nakshab, the name of a city in Transoxiana, where they say there is a well, in which the appearance of the moon is to be seen night and day.”

Note 135,  p. 98.—Round the rich city and the plain for miles.

“Il amusa pendant deux mois le peuple de la ville de Nekhscheb, en faisant sortir toutes les nuits du fond d’un puits un corps lumineux semblable à la Lune, qui portoit sa lumière jusqu’à la distance de plusieurs milles.”—D’Herbelot. Hence he was called Sazendéhmah, or the Moon-maker.

Note 136,  p. 99.—Had rested on the Ark.

The Shechinah, called Sakînat in the Koran.—See Sale’s Note, chap. ii.

Note 137,  p. 99.—Of the small drum with which they count the night.

The parts of the night are made known as well by instruments of music, as by the rounds of the watchmen with cries and small drums.—See Burder’s Oriental Customs, vol. i. p. 119.

Note 138,  p. 99.—On for the lamps, that light yon lofty screen.

The Serrapurda, high screens of red cloth, stiffened with cane, used to enclose a considerable space round the royal tents.—Notes on the Bahardanush.

The tents of Princes were generally illuminated. Norden tells us that the tent of the Bey of Girge was distinguished from the other tents by forty lanterns being suspended before it.—See Harmer’s Observations on Job.

Note 139,  p. 100.—Pour to the spot, like bees of Kauzeroon.

“From the groves of orange trees at Kauzeroon the bees cull a celebrated honey.”—Morier’s Travels.

Note 140,  p. 102.—Of nuptial pomp, she sinks into his tide.

“A custom still subsisting at this day, seems to me to prove that the Egyptians formerly sacrificed a young virgin to the God of the Nile; for they now make a statue of earth in shape of a girl, to which they give the name of the Betrothed Bride, and throw it into the river.”—Savary.

Note 141,  p. 103.—Engines of havoc in, unknown before.

That they knew the secret of the Greek fire among the Mussulmans early in the eleventh century, appears from Dow’s Account of Mamood I. “When he arrived at Moultan, finding that the country of the Jits was defended by great rivers, he ordered fifteen hundred boats to be built, each of which he armed with six iron spikes, projecting from their prows and sides, to prevent their being boarded by the enemy, who were very expert in that kind of war. When he had launched this fleet, he ordered twenty archers into each boat, and five others with fire-balls, to burn the craft of the Jits, and naphtha to set the whole river on fire.”

The agnee aster, too, in Indian poems the Instrument of fire, whose flame cannot be extinguished, is supposed to signify the Greek Fire.—See Wilks’s South of India, vol. i. p. 471.—And in the curious Javan Poem, the Brata Yudha, given by Sir Stamford Raffles in his History of Java, we find, “He aimed at the heart of Soéta with the sharp-pointed Weapon of Fire.”

The mention of gunpowder as in use among the Arabians, long before its supposed discovery in Europe, is introduced by Ebn Fadhl, the Egyptian geographer, who lived in the thirteenth century. “Bodies,” he says, “in the form of scorpions, bound round and filled with nitrous powder, glide along, making a gentle noise; then, exploding, they lighten, as it were, and burn. But there are others which, cast into the air, stretch along like a cloud, roaring horribly, as thunder roars, and on all sides vomiting out flames, burst, burn, and reduce to cinders whatever comes in their way.” The historian Ben Abdalla, in speaking of the sieges of Abulualid in the year of the Hegira 712, says, “A fiery globe, by means of combustible matter, with a mighty noise suddenly emitted, strikes with the force of lightning, and shakes the citadel.”—See the Extracts from Casiri’s Biblioth. Arab. Hispan. in the Appendix to Berington’s Literary History of the Middle Ages.

Note 142,  p. 103.—And horrible as new;—javelins that fly.

The Greek fire, which was occasionally lent by the emperors to their allies. “It was,” says Gibbon, “either launched in red hot balls of stone and iron, or darted in arrows or javelins, twisted round with flax and tow, which had deeply imbibed the inflammable oil.”

Note 143,  p. 103.—Discharge, as from a kindled Naphtha fount.

See Hanway’s Account of the Springs of Naphtha at Baku (which is called by Lieutenant Pottinger Joala Mokee, or, the Flaming Mouth) taking fire and running into the sea. Dr. Cooke, in his Journal, mentions some wells in Circassia, strongly impregnated with this inflammable oil, from which issues boiling water. “Though the weather,” he adds, “was now very cold, the warmth of these wells of hot water produced near them the verdure and flowers of spring.”

Major Scott Waring says, that naphtha is used by the Persians, as we are told it was in hell, for lamps.

Note 144,  p. 104.—Like those wild birds that by the Magians oft.

“At the great festival of fire, called the Sheb Sezê, they used to set fire to large bunches of dry combustibles, fastened round wild beasts and birds, which being then let loose, the air and earth appeared one great illumination; and as these terrified creatures naturally fled to the woods for shelter, it is easy to conceive the conflagrations they produced.”—Richardson’s Dissertation.

Note 145,  p. 106.—Keep, seal’d with precious musk, for those they love.

“The righteous shall be given to drink of pure wine, sealed; the seal whereof shall be musk.”—Koran, chap. lxxxiii.

Note 146,  p. 110.—On its own brood;—no Demon of the Waste.

“The Afghauns believe each of the numerous solitudes and deserts of their country to be inhabited by a lonely demon, whom they call the Ghoolee Beeabau, or Spirit of the Waste. They often illustrate the wildness of any sequestered tribe, by saying, they are wild as the Demon of the Waste.”—Elphinstone’s Caubul.

Note 147,  p. 111.—With burning drugs, for this last hour distill’d.

“Il donna du poison dans le vin à tous ses gens, et se jetta lui-même ensuite dans une cuve pleine de drogues brûlantes et consumantes, afin qu’il ne restât rien de tous les membres de son corps, et que ceux qui restoient de sa secte puissent croire qu’il étoit monté au ciel, ce qui ne manqua pas d’arriver.”—D’Herbelot.

Note 148,  p. 113.—In the lone Cities of the Silent dwell.

“They have all a great reverence for burial-grounds, which they sometimes call by the poetical name of Cities of the Silent, and which they people with the ghosts of the departed, who sit each at the head of his own grave, invisible to mortal eyes.”—Elphinstone.

Note 149,  p. 120.—And to eat any mangoes but those of Mazagong was, of course, impossible.—“The celebrity of Mazagong is owing to its mangoes, which are certainly the best fruit I ever tasted. The parent-tree, from which all those of this species have been grafted, is honoured during the fruit-season by a guard of sepoys; and, in the reign of Shah Jehan, couriers were stationed between Delhi and the Mahratta coast to secure an abundant and fresh supply of mangoes for the royal table.”—Mrs. Graham’s Journal of a Residence in India.

Note 150,  p. 120.—Laden with his fine antique porcelain.—This old porcelain is found in digging, and “if it is esteemed, it is not because it has acquired any new degree of beauty in the earth, but because it has retained its ancient beauty; and this alone is of great importance in China, where they give large sums for the smallest vessels which were used under the Emperors Yan and Chun, who reigned many ages before the dynasty of Tang, at which time porcelain began to be used by the Emperors” (about the year 442).—Dunn’s Collection of curious Observations, &c.;—a bad translation of some parts of the Lettres Edifiantes et Curieuses of the Missionary Jesuits.

Note 151,  p. 122.—And if Nasser, the Arabian merchant, told no better.—“La lecture de ces Fables plaisoit si fort aux Arabes, que, quand Mahomet les entretenoit de l’Histoire de l’Ancien Testament, ils les méprisoient, lui disant que celles que Nasser leur racontoit étoient beaucoup plus belles. Cette préférence attira à Nasser la malédiction de Mahomet et de tous ses disciples.”—D’Herbelot.

Note 152,  p. 122.—Like the blacksmith’s apron converted into a banner.—The blacksmith Gao, who successfully resisted the tyrant Zohak, and whose apron became the Royal Standard of Persia.

Note 153,  p. 125.—That sublime bird, which flies always in the air, and never touches the earth.—“The Huma, a bird peculiar to the East. It is supposed to fly constantly in the air, and never touch the ground: it is looked upon as a bird of happy omen; and that every head it overshades will in time wear a crown.”—Richardson.

In the terms of alliance made by Fuzzel Oola Khan with Hyder in 1760, one of the stipulations was, “that he should have the distinction of two honorary attendants standing behind him, holding fans composed of the feathers of the Humma, according to the practice of his family.”—Wilk’s South of India. He adds in a note:—“The Humma is a fabulous bird. The head over which its shadow once passes will assuredly be circled with a crown. The splendid little bird suspended over the throne of Tippoo Sultaun, found at Seringapatam in 1799, was intended to represent this poetical fancy.”

Note 154,  p. 125.—Like those on the Written Mountain, last for ever.—“To the pilgrims to Mount Sinai we must attribute the inscriptions, figures, &c. on those rocks, which have from thence acquired the name of the Written Mountain.”—Volney. M. Gebelin and others have been at much pains to attach some mysterious and important meaning to these inscriptions; but Niebuhr, as well as Volney, thinks that they must have been executed at idle hours by the travellers to Mount Sinai, “who were satisfied with cutting the unpolished rock with any pointed instrument; adding to their names and the date of their journeys some rude figures which bespeak the hand of a people but little skilled in the arts.”—Niebuhr.

Note 155,  p. 125.—Like the old Man of the Sea, upon his back.—The Story of Sinbad.

Note 156,  p. 126.—To which Hafez compares his mistress’s hair.—See Nott’s Hafez, Ode v.

Note 157,  p. 126.—To the Cámalatá, by whose rosy blossoms the heaven of Indra is scented.—“The Cámalatá (called by Linnæus, Ipomæa) is the most beautiful of its order, both in the colour and form of its leaves and flowers; its elegant blossoms are ‘celestial rosy red, Love’s proper hue,’ and have justly procured it the name of Cámalatá, or Love’s Creeper.”—Sir W. Jones.

“Cámalatá may also mean a mythological plant, by which all desires are granted to such as inhabit the heaven of Indra; and if ever flower was worthy of paradise, it is our charming Ipomæa”—Sir W. Jones.

Note 158,  p. 126.—That flower-loving Nymph whom they worship in the temples of Kathay.—“According to Father Premare, in his tract on Chinese Mythology, the mother of Fo-hi was the daughter of heaven, surnamed Flower-loving; and as the nymph was walking alone on the bank of a river, she found herself encircled by a rainbow, after which she became pregnant, and, at the end of twelve years, was delivered of a son radiant as herself.”—Asiat. Res.

Note 159,  p. 130.—With its plane-tree Isle reflected clear.

“Numerous small islands emerge from the Lake of Cashmere. One is called Char Chenaur, from the plane-trees upon it.”—Foster.

Note 160,  p. 130.—And the golden floods that thitherward stray.

“The Altan Kol or Golden River of Tibet, which runs into the Lakes of Sing-su-hay, has abundance of gold in its sands, which employs the inhabitants all the summer in gathering it.”—Description of Tibet in Pinkerton.

Note 161,  p. 131.—Blooms nowhere but in Paradise.

“The Brahmins of this province insist that the blue campac flowers only in Paradise.”—Sir W. Jones. It appears, however, from a curious letter of the sultan of Menangcabow, given by Marsden, that one place on earth may lay claim to the possession of it. “This is the Sultan, who keeps the flower champaka that is blue, and to be found in no other country but his, being yellow elsewhere.”—Marsden’s Sumatra.

Note 162,  p. 131.—Flung at night from angel hands.

“The Mahometans suppose that falling stars are the firebrands wherewith the good angels drive away the bad, when they approach too near the empyrean or verge of the heavens.”—Fryer.

Note 163,  p. 132.—Beneath the pillars of Chilminar.

The Forty Pillars; so the Persians call the ruins of Persepolis. It is imagined by them that this palace and the edifices at Balbec were built by Genii, for the purpose of hiding in their subterraneous caverns immense treasures, which still remain there.—See D’Herbelot and Volney.

Note 164,  p. 132.—To the south of sun-bright Araby.—The Isles of Panchaia.

Diodorus mentions the Isle of Panchaia, to the south of Arabia Felix, where there was a temple of Jupiter. This island, or rather cluster of isles, has disappeared, “sunk (says Grandpré) in the abyss made by the fire beneath their foundations.”—Voyage to the Indian Ocean.

Note 165,  p. 132.—The jewell’d cup of their King Jamshid.

“The cup of Jamshid, discovered, they say, when digging for the foundations of Persepolis.”—Richardson.

Note 166,  p. 132.—O’er coral rocks, and amber beds.

“It is not like the Sea of India, whose bottom is rich with pearls and ambergris, whose mountains of the coast are stored with gold and precious stones, whose gulfs breed creatures that yield ivory, and among the plants of whose shores are ebony, red wood, and the wood of Hairzan, aloes, camphor, cloves, sandal-wood, and all other spices and aromatics: where parrots and peacocks are birds of the forest, and musk and civet are collected upon the lands.”—Travels of Two Mohammedans.

Note 167,  p. 133.—Thy Pagods and thy pillar’d shades.

For a particular description and plate of the Banyan-tree, see Cordiner’s Ceylon.

Note 168,  p. 133.—Thy Monarchs and their thousand Thrones.

“With this immense treasure Mamood returned to Ghizni, and in the year 400 prepared a magnificent festival, where he displayed to the people his wealth in golden thrones and in other ornaments, in a great plain without the city of Ghizni.”—Ferishta.

Note 169,  p. 133.—’Tis He of Gazna—fierce in wrath.

“Mahmood of Gazna, or Ghizni, who conquered India in the beginning of the 11th century.”—See his History in Dow and Sir J. Malcolm.

Note 170,  p. 133.—Of many a young and lov’d Sultana.

“It is reported that the hunting equipage of the Sultan Mahmood was so magnificent, that he kept 400 greyhounds and bloodhounds, each of which wore a collar set with jewels, and a covering edged with gold and pearls.”—Universal History, vol. iii.

Note 171,  p. 134.—For Liberty shed, so holy is.

Objections may be made to my use of the word Liberty in this, and more especially in the story that follows it, as totally inapplicable to any state of things that has ever existed in the East; but though I cannot, of course, mean to employ it in that enlarged and noble sense which is so well understood at the present day, and, I grieve to say, so little acted upon, yet it is no disparagement to the word to apply it to that national independence, that freedom from the interference and dictation of foreigners, without which, indeed, no liberty of any kind can exist; and for which both Hindoos and Persians fought against their Mussulman invaders with, in many cases, a bravery that deserved much better success.