[23] Ormuzd employed himself for three thousand years in making the heavens and their celestial inhabitants, the Ferohers, which are the angels and the unembodied souls of all intelligent beings. All nature is filled with Ferohers, or guardian angels, who watch over its various departments, and are occupied in performing their various tasks for the benefit of mankind.--_Erskine on the Sacred Books and Religion of the Parsis, in the Transactions of the Literary Society of Bombay_, vol. ii. p. 318. The Feroher bears in fact a very strong resemblance to the Genius of the ancient Roman religion: see our Mythology of Greece and Italy. [24] This word is pronounced _Perry_ or rather _Parry_. [25] [Illustration] Hence it follows that the very plausible idea of the Peri having been the same with the Feroher cannot be correct. [26] Translated by Mr. Duncan Forbes. It is to be regretted that he has employed the terms Fairies and Demons instead of Peries and Deevs. [27] See Lane, Thousand and One Nights, i. p. 21, _seq._ [28] The Cahermân Nâmeh is a romance in Turkish. Cahermân was the father of Sâm, the grandfather of the celebrated Roostem. [29] It is in the Cahermân Nâmeh that this circumstance occurs. [30] [Illustration] The Tahmuras Nâmeh is also in Turkish. It and the Cahermân Nâmeh are probably translations from the Persian. As far as we are aware, Richardson is the only orientalist who mentions these two romances. [31] [Illustration] It signifies 'thirty birds' and is thought to be the roc of the Arabs. The poet Sâdee, to express the bounty of the Almighty says [Illustration] His liberal board he spreadeth out so wide, On Kâf the Seemurgh is with food supplied. The Seemurgh probably belongs to the original mythology of Persia, for she appears in the early part of the Shâh Nâmeh. When Zâl was born to Sâm Nerimân, his hair proved to be white. The father regarding this as a proof of Deev origin, resolved to expose him, and sent him for that purpose to Mount Elburz. Here the poor babe lay crying and sucking his fingers till he was found by the Seemurgh, who abode on the summit of Elburz, as she was looking for food for her young ones. But God put pity into her heart, and she took him to her nest and reared him with her young. As he grew up, the caravans that passed by, spread the fame of his beauty and his strength, and a vision having informed Sâm that he was his son, he set out for Elburz to claim him from the Seemurgh. It was with grief that Zâl quitted the maternal nest. The Seemurgh, when parting with her foster-son, gave him one of her feathers, and bade him, whenever he should be in trouble or danger, to cast it into the fire, and he would have proof of her power; and she charged him at the same time strictly never to forget his nurse. [32] See _Arabian Romance_. [33] [Illustration] a pearl. Life, soul also, according to Wilkins.