Indeed there is hardly any circumstance connected with this extraordinary gift more calculated to excite wonder than the extent and accuracy of his acquaintance with the various literatures of the languages to which he had applied himself. The fact is attested by so many witnesses that it is impossible to doubt it. Numerous instances have been already cited; but I cannot pass from this period of his life without adding a few others, chiefly regarding oriental languages, taken almost at random from many independent testimonies which have been communicated to me by persons who enjoyed his intimacy during the early years of his residence at Rome. In a commission for the revision of the liturgical books of the Armenian rite appointed by Pope Gregory XVI., he was associated with a native Armenian scholar, Father Arsenius Angiarakian, Abbot of the Monastery of St. Gregory the Illuminator. This learned ecclesiastic, in a letter dated August 15, 1855, assures me that during the frequent opportunities of observation which a literary inquiry of such exceeding delicacy afforded, he was astonished (_ho dovuto stupire_) at the profound knowledge of the ancient language of Armenia, exhibited by his associate. He adds that Mezzofanti “spoke the vulgar Armenian with perfect freedom, and in all its dialects.” Mgr. Hurmuz, the Armenian Archbishop of Sirace, in a letter of May 24th, in the same year, attests that Mezzofanti’s Armenian scholarship “was not confined to the knowledge of the language, ancient and modern; he also knew the history of the Armenian nation, and of science and art among them, together with their periods of progress and decay.” Father Arsenius frequently introduced oriental visitors, especially Turks and Persians, to Mezzofanti. Ahmed Fethi Pasha, with his Secretary, Sami Effendi, was presented to him on his way to London in 1836. After a long interview he declared to Father Arsenius, that “Mezzofanti was not only perfectly at home in the vocabulary, the structure, and the pronunciation, both of Turkish and of Persian, but thoroughly and profoundly versed (_possedeva per eccellenza_) in both literatures—being master of the great classic prose writers and poets of both, and their literary history.” He received the same assurances as to both languages, at various times, from Redschid Pasha, Ali Pasha, Fuad Effendi, and Shekib Effendi. A native Syrian whom M. Antoine d’Abbadie met in Rome in 1839, assured him that “Mezzofanti’s knowledge of Arabic and fluency in speaking it were both equally admirable.”[476]