A Prince of Dreamers

Transcriber's Notes: 1. Page scan source: http://books.google.com/books?id=vFkpAQAAIAAJ (University of California) 2. Table of Contents added by Transcriber.
OH LORD! WHOSE SECRETS ARE FOR EVER VEILED AND WHOSE PERFECTION KNOWS NOT A BEGINNING; (END AND BEGINNING BOTH ARE LOST IN THEE NO TRACE OF THEM IN THY ETERNAL REALM) MY WORDS ARE LAME--MY TONGUE A STONY TRACT-- SLOW WINGS MY SOUL--AND WIDE IS THE EXPANSE-- CONFUSED MY THOUGHTS--THIS THY BEST PRAISE, IN ECSTASY I SEE THEE FACE TO FACE.
-- Abul Faiz, Poet-Laureate at the Court of Akbar
THE BIRD OF THE MORNING ONLY KNOWETH THE WORTH OF THE BOOK OF THE ROSE; FOR NOT EVERY ONE WHO READETH THE PAGE UNDERSTANDETH THE MEANING.-- Hafiz .
The fiction which resembles truth is better than the truth which is dissevered from the imagination, said the Persian poet Nizami, in the year 1250.
It remains true, however, to-day. So I give no excuse for this book. It is not one which will appeal to the man in the street. Nevertheless I make the attempt to give the character and the times of the Prince of Dreamers with a glad heart. It is as well that the twentieth century of the West should know something of the sixteenth century in the East.
So many of my dramatis personæ once lived in the flesh and spoke many of the words imputed to them in the following pages, that it will be shorter to designate those who are purely imaginary puppets.
To begin with Mirza Ibrahîm and Khodadâd. For obvious reasons it is always safer in historical novels to draw the out-and-out villains with imagination. The death of the latter, however, together with the curious privileges of the Târkhâns are part of the truth which is stranger than fiction.
Pâyandâr Khân, the Wayfarer, is so far possible that the heir to the throne of Sinde, who bore that name, suddenly lost his senses in consequence of some direful tragedy, disappeared into the desert, and was no more heard of. The crediting of him with hypnotic powers is offered as an explanation of many marvels which are constantly cropping up in Indian story and legend.