extant, and shows the enormous amount of writings produced by
the Arabs during the periods under review, up to A.D. 987, the date of
the author's work. A short account of this ancient and curious book
has been given in the _Journal Asiatique_ for December, 1839, and
from the work itself Von Hammer Purgstall has been able to gather that
the 'Thousand and One Nights' ('Arabian Nights') had a Persian origin.
In the eighth section of the 'Fihrist' the author says that the first
who composed tales and apologues were the kings of the early Persian
dynasties, and that these tales were augmented and amplified by the
Sasanians (A.D. 228-641). The Arabs then translated them into their
own language, and composed other stories like them.

Ibn Khallikan, the most worthy of biographers, must also be mentioned
here, though he died in A.D. 1282, twenty-four years after the fall of
Baghdad, having been born in A.D. 1211. This very eminent scholar and
follower of Shafa'i doctrines, was born at Arbela, but resided at
Damascus, where he had filled the place of Chief Kadi till the year
A.D. 1281, when he was dismissed, and from that time to the day of his
death he never went out of doors. He was a man with the greatest
reputation for learning, versed in various sciences, and highly
accomplished. He was a scholar, a poet, a compiler, a biographer and
an historian. By his talents and writings he merited the honourable
title of the most learned man and the ablest historian. His celebrated
biographical work, called the 'Wafiat-ul-Aiyan,' or Deaths of Eminent
Men, is the acme of perfection. This work was translated from the
Arabic by Baron MacGuckin de Slane, a member of the council of the
Asiatic Society of Paris, and printed by the Oriental Translation Fund
of Great Britain and Ireland in A.D. 1842, 1843, 1868 and 1871. For
all those who wish to gain a knowledge of the legal literature of the
Muhammadans it is a most valuable work, as the Baron has added to the
text numerous learned notes, replete with curious and interesting
information relating to the Muhammadan law and lawyers. Ibn Khallikan
died, aged seventy-three lunar years, in the Najibia College at
Damascus, and was buried in the cemetery of As-Salihiya, a well-known
village situated on the declivity of Mount Kasiun, a short distance to
the north of Damascus, and from which a splendid view of the town and
its surrounding gardens is obtained. When lately there I made
inquiries about th