The account of the Caliph al-Musta'ṣim's character with which the Kitábu'l-Fakhrí concludes leaves us with the im­pression of an amiable but weak ruler, ill-fitted to grapple with the fearful peril which overshadowed all his days ere it finally overwhelmed him. He was attentive to his religious duties, gentle, continent in word and deed, a good scholar and calli­graphist, devoted to his books, and very considerate towards his attendants; but, on the other hand, timid in action, undecided in judgement, and ignorant of statecraft. He refused to follow the evil custom generally followed by his predecessors of keeping his sons and other nearer male relatives in confine­ment, lest they should conspire against him or seek to usurp his place; and on one occasion, when a young servant had fallen asleep on the ground beside him while he was reading in his library, and in his sleep had rolled on to the carpet specially spread for him, and even put his feet on the cushion against which he was leaning, he signed to the librarian to wait till he had left the room, and then to wake the lad, lest he should be overcome with fear and confusion on account of what he had done. In love of books and encouragement of men of letters the wazír Ibnu'l-'Alqamí was not behind his master: his library comprised ten thousand volumes, including many rare and precious works, and many authors and poets dedicated their works to him. He was also, according to Ibnu'ṭ-Ṭiqṭiqí, from whom all these particulars are derived, not only liberal, but quite devoid of the love of wealth.

Like the author of the Ṭabaqát-i-Náṣirí, I should have pre­ferred to end this volume of mine, so far as the historical portion of it is concerned, with some event less lamentable than this, the supreme catastrophe of Islám and of the Arabo-Persian civilisation of the 'Abbásid Caliphate. But here is the natural point at which to interrupt my Literary History of Persia: a history which I hope some day to continue in another volume, or in other volumes, down to our own times. But, so far as this volume is concerned, it remains only for me to discuss in two concluding chapters the literature of the period which I have just attempted to sketch in outline; a period, roughly speaking, which comprises the first fifty or sixty years of the thirteenth century of our era.