ORIGINAL PREFACE.
illustrate, and they were evidently mentioned by the author for the mere object of acquiring credit for the accuracy and extent of his researches.
Again, a native gentleman furnished a catalogue of the manuscripts said to compose the historical collection of his Highness the Nizám; but on close examination I found that, from beginning to end, it was a complete fabrication, the names of the works being taken from the prefaces of standard histories, in which it is usual to quote the authorities,—the very identical sequence of names, and even the errors of the originals, being implicitly followed.
Against these impudent and interested frauds we must consequently be on our guard, not less than against the blunders arising from negligence and ignorance; the misquoting of titles, dates, and names; the ascriptions to wrong authors; the absence of beginnings and endings; the arbitrary substitution of new ones to complete a mutilated manuscript; the mistakes of copyists; the exercise of ingenuity in their corrections, and of fancy in their additions; all these, added to the ordinary sources of error attributable to the well-known difficulty of deciphering Oriental manuscripts, present many obstacles sufficient to damp even the ardour of an enthusiast. Besides which, we have to lament the entire absence of literary history and biography, which in India is devoted only to saints and poets. Where fairy tales and fictions are included under the general name of history we cannot expect to learn much respecting the character, pursuits, motives, and actions of historians, unless they are pleased to reveal them to us themselves, and to entrust us with their familiar confidences; or unless they happen to have enacted a conspicuous part in the scenes which they describe. Even in Europe this deficiency has been complained of; how much more, then, is it likely to be a subject of regret, where despotism is triumphant; where the active elements of life are few; and where individual character, trammeled by so many restraining influences, has no opportunity of development.
It must be understood, then, that this Index has not been constructed on account of any intrinsic value in the histories themselves. Indeed, it is almost a misnomer to style them histories. They can scarcely claim to rank higher than Annals. “Erat enim historia
