The musical school, founded at Cordova by Ali-Zeriab, produced the famous Moussali, who was regarded by the Orientals as the greatest musician of his time. The music of the Moors did not consist, like ours, in the concord of different instruments, but simply in soft and tender airs, which the musicians sung to the accompaniment of the lute. Sometimes several voices and lutes executed the same air in unison. This simple style of music satisfied a people who were {213} such passionate lovers of poetry, that their first desire, when listening to a singer, was to hear the words he uttered. Moussali, who was the pupil of Ali-Zeriab at Cordova, became afterward, in consequence of his musical talents, the favourite of Haroun al Raschid, the celebrated caliph of the East. It is related that this prince, in consequence of a misunderstanding with one of his favourite wives, fell into such a slate of melancholy that fears were entertained for his life. Giaffar, the Bermacide, at that time the principal vizier of the caliph, entreated the poet Abbas-ben-Ahnaf to compose some verses on the subject of this quarrel. He did so, and they were sung in the presence of the prince by Moussali; and the royal lover was so softened by the sentiments of the poet and the melody of the musician, that he immediately flew to the feet of his fair enslaver, and a reconciliation took place between the disconsolate monarch and the offended beauty. The grateful slave sent twenty thousand drachms of gold to the poet and Moussali, and Haroun added forty thousand more to her gift. G, page 66. _The statue of the beautiful Zahra, &c._ Mohammed, to discourage idolatry, forbade his followers, in the Koran, to make images in any form; but this injunction was very imperfectly observed. The Oriental caliphs adopted the custom of stamping their coins with an impression of their own features, as is proved by specimens still existing in the collections of the curious. On one side of these was represented the head of the reigning caliph, and on the other appeared his name, with some passages from the Alcoran. In the palaces of Bagdad, Cordova and Grenada, figures of animals, and sculpture of various kinds, both in gold and marble, abounded. {214} H, page 69. _The richest and most powerful, &c._