QURAIŠ had not been distinguished for great poets in the time of paganism, but during the first century after the Hijra they boasted of the following five: 'Umar b. Abī Rabī'a, al-Ḥārith b. Ḫālid al-Maḫzūmī, al-'ArǦī, Abū Dahbal al-ǧumaḥī, and Ibn Qais ar-Ruqayyāt. Of the first and last named we possess excellent editions; I give here the text of what remains of Abū. Dahbal, while of the other two we have scattered in the Kitāb al-Aġānī and elsewhere a fair number of poems to give us an opportunity of comparing the style of their poetry with that of the poets of other Arab tribes. A lighter vein appears to pervade all these poems; a large predominance is given to the shorter metres, and the poems also are as a rule shorter than the lengthy qaṣīdas of poets from other tribes. As might be expected, the descriptions of the desert and its typical animals and phenomena are practically lacking. These men were born and brought up in towns; how could they share the ideas of the Bedouin Arab roving through the wide country?

Le commandant d'Ollone a rapporté de sa dernière mission scientifique diverses inscriptions chinoises qui peuvent fournir d'utiles indications sur l'histoire des régions du sud-ouest de la Chine.

Plusieurs de ces inscriptions ont été publiées dans le Journal Asiatique de Paris de Juillet-Août, 1909, traduites et commentées par M. Chavannes, professeur au Collège de France et membre de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles lettres.

[On p. 566 ante reference was made to the two kalās or schools of the Viśiṣtâdvaita Vaiṣṇavas—the Teṅgalai and the Vaḍagali. The points of difference in their doctrines are of considerable importance for the study of religion in India, and I have much pleasure in forwarding to the Royal Asiatic Society the enclosed communication from Swārī Gōvindâcārya, himself a follower of the Tengali belief. It may be noted that while each school has numerous adherents in Southern India, the great majority of Vaiṣṇavas of Northern India trace their spiritual descent from Rāmânanda, and profess doctrines akin to those of the Vaḍagalai.—G. A. G.]

EIGHT years ago I had the honour of reading a paper before the Royal Asiatic Society termed “Historical Notes on South-East Persia”. In 1905 I was appointed to Khurāsān, and the following notes are the result of various tours. My thanks are due to Khan Bahadur Ahmad Din, Attaché to His Britannic Majesty's Consulate-General, for checking the various inscriptions, and, more especially, for enabling me to give the first clear and accurate account of the famous Meshed Shrine.

DURING a recent visit to Assam I made some notes on the religion of the country which may possibly prove of interest. The forms of Hinduism prevalent there merit attention for two reasons. Firstly, they present some special developments of the Vaishnava faith in which monasticism and puritanism attain a prominence unusual in contemporary India and, secondly, they illustrate clearly and compendiously the methods by which the propagation of Hinduism in areas originally not Hindu is effected. The historical record, if not ancient, is exceptionally authentic for the last few centuries, and though the Assamese sects have features of their own yet the circumstances of their rise and subdivision may throw light on what occurred elsewhere.

The New History of the T'ang dynasty relates that in a.d. 648 the Chinese envoy Wang Hsüan-ts'ê, having raised an army in Tibet and Nep¯al, advanced into Central India as far as the town Ch'a-po-ho-lo, which he stormed after three days’ siege. The Na-fu-ti(or Ti-na-fu-ti) A-lo-na-shun, an usurper who had just seized the throne after the death of King Śīlāditya (i.e. Harṣavardhana Śīlāditya of Kanauj), thereupon fled, but was shortly afterwards taken prisoner. A band of his dispersed followers, however, took position, barring the way across the Kan-t'o-wei River, but were in their turn routed by Hsüan-ts'ê's second in command.

REPRODUCTIONS of the Dalai Lama's seal are found in Waddell's Lhasa and its Mysteries, p. 448, and in Walsh's Coinage of Tibet, MASB, vol. ii, p. 16. No attempt to read it has as yet been made, and neither of the reproductions is absolutely correct, though Waddell's is by far the better of the two. In the accompanying plate I give copies of both these versions, together with my own corrected version.

In the present article I give a translation and description of the anatomical chart kept in the Temple Medicine on the lChags-po-ri (“Iron Hill”) at Lhasa which, together with its connected monastery, forms the medical college of Tibet. The chart demonstrates the Tibetan science of anatomy, and every Tibetan doctor taught his anatomy from it.

The other and most ancient historical edicts discovered by me at Lhasa are inscribed upon a lofty pillar of victory which stands at the foot of Potala Hill, under the castle of the ancient kings, now incorporated in the palace of the Talai Lamas.

IN the July number of this Journal, p. 836, I promised to publish the text of the Aparimitāyuḥ Sūtra. As I have not yet received the Cambridge manuscripts of that Sūtra, I must defer the fulfilment of my promise to a later issue of the Journal. In the meantime I have compared the Sanskrit text of the Vajracchedikā, in Max Müller's edition, with the “unknown language” text in Dr. Stein's manuscript; and I may now present two extended “bilingual” extracts from the two texts. So far as I am able to judge at present, the East-Turkestani text does not appear to be a translation, throughout, of the Sanskrit text, as published by Max Müller. It is so, however, quite clearly in certain portions; and it is some of these portions that I am now presenting as a preliminary contribution.