The four epochs into which, the political history of ancient Northern India is naturally divided are marked by four imperial dynasties — (I) the Maurya, (II) the Kusana or Kushān, (III) the Gupta, and (IV) the Rājpūt line of Harṣavardhana. The date of the Maurya, the earliest of the four dynasties, was practically determined more than a century ago by Sir William Jones, and we know that Candra Gupta Maurya, the first emperor of India, and grandfather of Aśoka, ascended the throne in or about the year b.c. 321.

The two principal terms of lineal measure adopted by Fa-hian, Yuan Chwang, and other Chinese pilgrims, in their narratives of the different countries in India and on its frontiers, are the yojana and the li.

Among the treasures brought to light by Dr. Stein in his excavations in Chinese Turkestan and lodged by him last summer in the British Museum, not the least interesting was a collection of fragmentary Tibetan manuscripts. These were found in the ruins of a Buddhist shrine buried in a site beyond the Endere stream, at the extreme eastern limit of the region explored, under circumstances which have already been detailed in Dr. Stein's “Preliminary Report,” pp. 55—56. It suffices here to say that the conditions under which the fragments were discovered were such as to make it practically impossible to date them later than the eighth century; and the evidence of a Chinese sgraffito in the same building has since proved this conclusion to be right. Hence they came to us as the earliest known relics of Tibetan literature.

I am indebted to Saiyid ‘Alī Bilgrāmī Shamsu'l-Ulama for a perusal of this MS. It was purchased by him in Haidarabad.

The MS. is truly remarkable, for it is a brouillon, or roughdraught, of the first volume of the Akbarnāma. It originally wanted many passages which occur in the Bib. Ind. and Lucknow editions, but most, if not all of them, have been supplied by two or more collators. They seem to have gone carefully through the MS. and compared it with some MS. of the finished work, and they have made numerous additions and omissions so as to bring it into accord with the latter. Where the additions are of some length they are inserted in the margin, and when they consist of only a word or two they are interlined. Some of the additions are verse, and this may remind us of Abul Faẓl's statement in the 'Aīn (Jarrett, iii, p. 415) that he inserted verses on the fifth revision. Perhaps only in two instances, viz., at p. 242, corresponding to p. 246 Bib. Ind. ed., which is the chapter describing Akbar's circumcision, and at p. 346 = Bib. Ind. 349, has a verse originally omitted been inserted in the body of the text, in a blank space left for the purpose. All the other missing verses are, I think, inserted in the margin.

The following narrative is derived from a MS. of the History of Mayyāfāriqin by Ibn al-Azraq al-Fāriqi, B.M. Or. 5,803, of which I have already given some account; see J.R.A.S., 1902, p. 785.

In the name of God the Merciful and Compassionate, and may God bless our lord Muḥammad and his family and his companions, and give them peace.

With reference to my article on MS. No. 29 of the Maxwell Collection in the Journal for July, 1902, my friend Mr. S. H. Ray, whose wide acquaintancewith a number of out-of-theway languages is well known, sends me the following note, which I think will be of interest to the readers of the Journal:—

“The languages of Mr. Blagden's specimens are, besides the Malay, (1) (Măkuah or M˘akuat), (2) or (Tulehu or Ambon Tulehu), (3) or (Mandura).