A literary history of Persia

ANQUETIL DU PERRON 47immediately concerned the Zoroastrian religion), partly by thepolitical complications of that time. After numerous adventures,however, he ultimately arrived at Surat on the dateindicated above. He at once put himself in relation with twoParsi dasturs, or priests,named Darab and Ka'us, from whom,three months later, he received, aftermany vexatious delaysand attempts at extortion and evasion, a professedly completecopy of the Vendidad. Fully aware of the necessity forcaution, he succeeded in borrowing from another dastur^Manuchihrji (who, owing to religious differences, was not onterms of intercourse with Darab and Ka'us) another good andancient manuscript of the same work ; and, on collating thiswith the other, he was not long in discovering that his twodasturs had deliberately supplied him with a defective copy.They, on being convicted of this fraud, became at once morecommunicative, and less disposed to attempt any furtherimposition, and furnished him with other works, such as thePersian Story of Sanjan (of which Anquetil gives an abstract atpp. cccxviii-cccxxiv of his work), an account of the descentof all copies of the Vendidad and its Pahlawi commentarypreserved in India from a Persian original brought thitherfrom Sistan by a dastur named Ardashir about the fourteenthcentury of our era, and a further account of the relationsmaintained from time to time by the Zoroastrians of Persiawith those of India.On March 24, 1759, Anquetil completed his translation ofthe Pahlawi-Persian vocabulary, and six days later began thetranslationof the Vendidad, which, together withAnquetil's work. , 11 c ^u Ayrcc 1 u c L jthe collation of the two Mbo., he finished onJune1 6th of the same year.A severe illness, followedby a savage attack by a compatriot, interrupted his workfor five months, and it was not till November 2Oth that hewas able to continue his labours with the help of the dasturDarab. During this time he received much help and friendlyprotection from the English, notably from Mr. Spencer, of