Part 10 (2/2)

We marched into Bokhara on the 12th of July, and betook ourselves straight to the spacious _tekkie_ (convent), shaded by trees, which, forht cells on the ground floor The chief of this building was the descendant of so universal respect Hadji Salih, my intimate friend and companion, had been at one time a pupil of this holy man, our present host, and, in that capacity, he took upon himself at once to introduce me and the more prominent members of our party to hi from such a source, ere received in theindulged in half an hour's conversation with me, his satisfaction seeret at the Badevlet's (his Majesty the E me to the Emir at once

He immediately ordered a separate cell, in the ned toa learned mollah, and the other Hadji Salih The tekkie was full of celebrities, and I had happened to light on the principal nest of religious fanaticisiven inforreat importance, and Rahmet-Bi, the first officer of the E the E inquiries of the hadjis about me, on the first day of my stay

But as the Emir's power does not extend to the tekkie, the inquisitiveness of his first officer was ht it worth while to infor of ood Mussulman, but a learned ainst hi day I went out with Hadji Salih and four others of our party, to take a look at the city and its bazaar Although the squalid and rickety buildings and the streets covered with sand, one foot thick, did not tend to place ”noble Bokhara” in thethe bazaar and beholding the throngingintensely interested at the novel sight The beauty and wealth of the bazaar were not the things that surprised me, so much as the immense and multifarious variety in races, dress and manners which struck the eye everywhere The type of Iran was visible in the faces of a great portion of the people; but the Tartar features, which could be seen in all their shades, frohiz, clai to their proenerally the Turanian race, uished froait Jews and Hindoos could be seen in great nulance at the contents of the shops, finding in theoods of the manufacture of Western Europe, but Russian manufactures were all the more extensively represented in thened to thehizes, the Kiptchaks, the Kalmuks and the inhabitants of Chinese Tartary resort toabout and observing for nearly three hours I becauide, Hadji Salih, to allow h the tea bazaar, to a place called the ”Divanbeg's Reservoir” It was a tolerably regular square, in the centre of which a lake, flagged with stones and shaded by nificent elm trees, was visible The place is encircled by tea-shops, in which gigantic _samovars_ (teapots),In numerous shops are sold candies, sweetourry people swarm A mosque stands on one side of the palace, in front of which dervishes and _meddahs_ (story-tellers) recount the heroic deeds of renowned prophets and warriors, distorting their features in every possible way as they do, to a large and curious audience As ere entering the squarea procession of fifteen dervishes from the cloister of Nakishbend pass before our eyes It was a sight not to be easily forgotten--theabout of these dervishes, in their wild fanaticis hair, waving their sticks, and bellowing forth in chorus a hy to theh I had put on a costuured ood nized me, I was followed, nevertheless, by a crowd of curious people, whose e by e Koran suspended from my neck, they evidently took me to be some ishan or Sheikh, and there was no way to escape the unpleasantness While in Bokhara, its people never, during the whole tih they are rather cunning and distrustful They would come to me for benedictions, listen to et from them

The authorities did not trust me as implicitly as the people did

Rahmet-Bi, the Emir's chief officer, whom I have mentioned before, could not assail me publicly, but he pestered e istan nah soht to frighten is covet the possession of Bokhara, and that several of their spies and en punishis (unfortunate Italians) who had co to their alleged importation of several boxes of tea, sprinkled with dia the entire population of the sacred city These spies were for thefor years in Constantinople, and were now trying to test e and the circuet rid of their obtrusions I pretended to a feeling of indignation and ii ”Why,” said I to theet rid of the sight of these Frengis who have robbed the devil of his reason I am now, thank God, in noble Bokhara, and have no wish to waste here ain one of the servants of Rahht tome to examine the individual, and then tell if he were an Arab fro I was struck by his features, and set hithened in this opinion after having talked with him for a while, for I found his pronunciation not to be the true Arabic at all He told rave there of some saint He was visibly eret not havingthe sa himself foiled in his attempts to draw me out by spies, invited me to a _pilar_ (a dish of rice and alaxy of the representatives of the ule my appearance As soon as I entered and looked about me I saw at once that the whole coment upon my case; that a hard task awaited me, and that h a fiery ordeal I thought best to anticipate their design, and instead of giving theed into a discussion of so them My zeal e, and a very heated dispute arising soon after, in which I was careful not to take any part, concerning some mooted points in the sacred book, I took occasion to loudly declare the mental superiority of the th, ave Rahmet-Bi to understand by nods and winks and words, that his official reporter had been outrageously htest doubt aboutmy whole stay in Bokhara the heat was intolerable, and I had to undergo besides the additional infliction of drinking ater as a preventative against getting the _rishte_, viz, the filaria medinensis, hich every tenth person here is afflicted People in Bokhara think as little of feeling in su sensation in their feet or any part of their bodies, as Europeans do of a cold The itching is followed after a while by a red spot, from the centre of which a worth at times, of several yards, and it must be carefully unwound in the course of a couple of days This is the regular course of the disease, which is otherwise unaccompanied by any pain But if the wor unwound, inflammation sets in, and six to ten appear where there had been one before, cos for a week The ets the rishte at once re it cut out The barbers in Bokhara perform the operation with considerable skill; the spot where the itching is felt is cut open in an instant, the worm removed, and the wound heals in a very short tiold-scattering) river by means of open aqueducts The canal is sunk to a sufficient depth, but not kept clean As it frequently happens to run dry, the water coain is received by the populace with shouts and screa and old, dive into the basin and take a regular bath; then comes the turn of the horses, cows, and asses, followed by the dogs When this general bathing ofinto it is forbidden; the water settles soain, but it remains, nevertheless, tainted with dirt andof the metropolitan character, withal, about Bokhara, at least it was so to afor a considerable tiood hot bread, I could get tea, fruit and cooked eatables; I even went to the length of having two shi+rts ot to like the comforts of civilized life to such an extent that it ith a pang of regret that I listened toof the preparations I should make for our departure, as they wished to reach their distant Eastern ho in of winter I intended, at all events, to accoht easily happen to reat service to me There, in Samarkand, I should then have to choose either to continue the journey to Kokhand and Kashgar, in their company, or to return by ed by Hadji Bilal and Hadji Salih to remain with them, but in order to afford me every facility, in case I would not be persuaded by the them at Samarkand, they made me acquainted with a kervanbashi+ fro in Bokhara with one hundred and fifty ca to leave for his home, Herat, in three weeks _Molla Zeman_ was the na time, and they recommended me to him in such cordial tered between me and Molla Zeman, that in case I made up my mind to return from Samarkand I should meet him in three weeks at Kerki, on the other side of the Oxus

Before saying good-bye to Bokhara I shall make some mention of the place where I first met him It was one of those caravansaries where the unfortunate slaves are put up for sale The Turkoman karaktchi, who hunts the Persians, cannot afford to wait a long time for his money, he therefore usually sells his human booty to soood e troop of slaves to Bokhara to be sold there He then sells asthe first days after his arrival, the rest which he is not able to dispose of he hands over to the dellal to be sold for him; the latter is the person who does the real wholesale business in slaves

Slaves of froe, unless from some cause or other they have become crippled, are constantly for sale in the ion, it is true, forbid them to sell into slavery any but unbelievers, but hypocritical Bokhara kno to elude the law Besides the shi+-ite Persians, who are declared to be unbelievers by the Sunnite law, any number of Sunnite true believers are sold into slavery, conscience being salved by the si them before their sale and by theshi+-ites

The male slave who is exposed for sale is publicly exauarantee that the article sold by hiets out of the clutches of the slave-dealer is his happiest, for it is impossible that such ill-treatment could await him, even at the hand of the worst master, as he endures whilst in the warehouses of the dealer in hu to the political situation, being favourable or unfavourable, as the Turko countries At the ti man was from forty to fifty tillas (from 2 10s to 3 10s); but at the time when the Persians were defeated near Merv, and 10,000 prisoners were taken, a ht at the low price of from three to four tillas This abominable traffic, I am happy to remark, has since the time of reatly abated; and it is very probable that ere long slaves will not be exposed for sale at all in Central Asia For the cessation of this horrible practice we are indebted to Russia, who has forbidden the slave trade in her own Asiatic possessions, as well as in the countries under her protection Nor can the Turkomans, the chief men-stealers, continue as before their inroads into Persia to carry away hteen days in Bokhara, and er, we had to proceed on our journey to Samarkand Our purses, too, were at a rather low ebb, for in Bokhara we got nothing beyond hand-shaking All that we had saved up in Khiva was spent by us in Bokhara I had to sell evenon in order to continue our journey Soood-bye to us here, and s and e I paid a farewell visit to Rahh to furnish me with a letter of recoet myself introduced to the Emir

The road to Sah well-cultivated fields, populous and nicely built villages We halted at five stations on this road Now that I was drawing near Samarkand all ings of old Mount Tchobanata, at the foot of which the city spreads, was already visible, and cli up an eminenceSamarkand, the city of Ti out, with fairy-like enchantment, with its many coloured cupolas and towers, illu sun

XXIV

IN SAMARKAND

The Tadjiks maintain to this day that _Samarkand_, this ancient city of Central Asia, is the centre of the world And it does, in truth, excel all the other cities of Central Asia, in its ancient rand toe caravansary where hadjis are provided with free quarters, but having been invited on the day of our arrival to establish uest in a private house near the tomb of Timur, I readily accepted the invitation and left the caravansary I was agreeably surprised to find in ed with the superintendence of the Emir's palace at Samarkand The return of the En at Kokhand, having been announced to take place in a few days,off their departure from Samarkand until I had an opportunity to see the Emir and find suitable companions for my return journey I e at the rereater variety is offered here than in any city in Central Asia Being a hadji I had, of course, to begin with the saints There are here about a hundred holy places to be visited, and the pilgri to the superior claims of persons and places to sanctity I would not deviate fro, in its proper turn, down to the s the character I was acting A only the mosque of Timur; that castle in one of the halls of which the celebrated _Kok-Tach_ (_ie_, green stone) is still to be seen upon which the great Emir had his throne erected, when its hall was croith vassals who hied froe; at that ti ready in the precincts of the amphitheatrically constructed hall to blazon forth the edicts of the conqueror of the world to the remotest corner of it The tomb of Ti too Only a portion of the latter are used as dwelling-places, and many of therand, is in ruins now, and in vain did I search withinwalls for even a trace of the renowned Arht to Samarkand to form one of the ornaments of his capital

[Illustration: SAMARKAND]

Whilst I was in Sa in the bazaars as well as in the public places and streets, to which the soldiers returning froreat extent The nuular population hardly exceeds fifteen to twenty thousand inhabitants, two-thirds of whoovern in Bokhara, used to spend two or threeto its enial cliht days in Samarkand, and I finally came to the conclusion to return to the West by way of Herat, taking the route I haveto send me safely to Mecca by way of Yarkend, Thibet and Cash by the way of Ko stress on the great distance and the scantiness of my means ”As far as Aksu, and even Komul,” he said, ”thou wouldst experience no difficulty, for Mussul the road, and they would have regard for you as a dervish from Roum; but beyond thou wilt meet unbelievers only, who, it is true, will not hurt thee, but will not give you anything either Therefore be advised, and return to Teheran by way of Herat, with theco on within h the ancient fastnesses of the Tartars, Khirgizes, Mongols, and Chinese, where even Marco Polo would not have dared to place his feet--would have been indeed a feat without a parallel! The voice of moderation prevailed with me after all I reflected that it would be a pity to risk losing the fruits of the experiences hitherto gathered, however trifling they reat uncertainty and undoubted danger

And putting off was not giving up; I was only thirty-one years old, and what I could not well do to-day I ht accomplish at some future day I made up my mind to return

My preparations for the journey had advanced considerably when the E place had been announced for soreat histan_ (principal public place), to witness the show, but I cannot say that any special poeant The procession was headed by two hundred sherbazes, wearing over the uncouth Bokhara costume some sort of overall of skin, to which piece of additional dress they were indebted for their being called regular troops They were followed by horsemen with banners and kettledrums, and behind these, at soher officers and chief men The Emir was forty-two years old, of middle size, rather stout, but very pleasant in appearance, with fine black eyes and a thin beard After the Emir caolian, armed with bows and arrows and shi+elds

The Eed for the people on the day of his arrival, several gigantic cauldrons being erected, on that occasion, on the righistan, in which the princely pilar was being cooked Into each of these cauldrons was thrown a sack of rice, three sheep chopped up, a large pan of h to make five pounds of tallow candles, and a s and drinking beggaring all description

An _arz_, that is a day for public audiences, was proclaie of this occasion to present myself in the co the interior of the city, ere startled to find ourselves stopped by a Mehreave us to understand that his Badevlet (majesty) wished to see me alone, without my companions My friends were this tie boded ill to me But as to be done but to follow the Mehre made to wait for about an hour I was conducted into a roo on aabout I recited a short Sura, accooverning prince, and after saying amen, to which the Emir responded, I sat down in close vicinity to hi first received his invitation to do so The Emir was struck bywith the character of a dervish He fixed his eyes severely onto embarrass me, and said:

”Hadji! I hear thou hast coraves of Baha-ed-din and the other holy men of Turkestan?”