Part 12 (2/2)
The ruhtering of the dog was interpreted as an iious rites of the true believers The rapacity and ladly seized this frivolous pretext ith to cloak their thirst for the blood of the detested Jew, and their love of pillage In an instant the Jewish quarter of the city was overrun with a savage rabble, rioting, robbing andThose that survived the fatal day had their lives spared on condition of abjuring the faith of their fathers and e that of their oppressors and persecutors They yielded to dire necessity, but in their hearts they re as they had to stay in Meshed Years had passed since, and although the tolerant spirit, which began to prevail under the benign influence of European interference, our, the Jews still deemed it more prudent to pass the the ruins of Tus to the north of Meshed lies, according to the belief of reatest of Iran's bards, the to the city I s of sincere piety and admiration that I approached the -place of one of the greatest national poets in the world In sixty thousand verses he sang the history of his people, without adn, that is Arabic, words into his narration This wonderful feat will be especially appreciated, if the fact is borne in mind that Persian--which he wrote as well as the in to every six words purely Iranian His generous patriotise of the oppressors of his country Not only as a poet, not only as a passionate lover of his country, will Firdusi's memory live for ever, but his exalted private character will always excite the admiration of mankind He was fearless and independent As an instance of his high-mindedness, it is told that Sultan Mahmud, the Ghazvenite, sent him on one occasion the remuneration of thirty thousand drachms
This was much less than the sum the Sultan had proht, and immediately scornfully directed that the entire su establish of his parsimony, subsequently sent the poet camels laden with treasure, but they caift was sent back to the ungratefulto accept of it
The poet had left a sting in the memory of the Sultan, in a satire which is reins with the following verse:
”Oh! Sultan Mahmud, if thou fearest none, yet fear God!”
What an abyss is there between the reat poet![5]
[Footnote 5: Areat poetical compositions of Mohammedan Asia, we may boldly call the poems of Hafiz, Saadi, and Firdusi the household works of every enlightened or rather of every educated Mohammedan As to the latter one, I have scarcely met with any Persian as not conversant with the heroes of the great epic called the ”Shah-Nameh;” and there is rarely a bath, a caravansary or any other public building, excepting es, which would not be adorned with pri the heroic feats of Rustem, Zal and Kai Khosrau The ”Shah-Nameh” is the only popular history of the Iranian world, it is the mirror in the resplendent radiance of which the Persian and the Central Asian delight to find the glory of by-gone ages; and really, without having read the ”Shah-Nameh,” we shall never be able to realize the wonderful spirit of that Asiatic world which was superseded by Islareat service done to the knowledge of the East In Ger to the form which they selected, their success was only a partial one, and the large public of the said country possesses but a frags”
Quite recently there has cos” (since re-published under the title of ”Heroic Tales”), stories retold from Firdusi, by _Helen Zihtfully written prose the chief and reat heroes of Iranian antiquity froh she has written a paraphrase and not a translation, the author, by uniting a rare poetical gift with a true understanding of the East, has succeeded in rendering the great epic accessible to the large reading public, which can now taste this justly famous poetical production of the East, and which will certainly be thankful to Miss Zimmern for the rare enjoy at my leisure for the winter journey to Teheran The overnor of the place, who received me most affably, loaded me with presents and overwhelmed me with marks of distinction Teheran was still thirty days'
journey fro a ride in winter was by no ht as I rode out of the city gates
XXVIII
FROM MESHED TO TEHERAN
The in leaves its dom of Persia; and so, in a certain liovernors for the tidohways To travel fro a staunch spirit, and the bravesthih Khorassan, where Turkomans, Beloochees and Kurds are an object of terror to all men, but more particularly to the cowardly native of Persia Sultan Murad Mirza, surnaovernor of the province at the tie of the country the praise was bestowed on hiht with perfect security carry a plateful of ducats upon the highways, without beingof the co, for there was not in the whole kingdoy and talent than he did to render the public highways safe, and to advance and encourage coh as I set out on my journey in the company of my Tartar Two routes fro over a h a lower hilly country I chose the latter As I passed out of the city,loaded with everything requisite for the journey, I felt in an exceptionally cheerful hu home which produced this effect
The contrast between the journey now before me, furnished with all the proper equip from all sorts of privations areatly added to this feeling We were continually ri fro are always exchanged My surprise at recognizing an old acquaintance in the leader of one of these caravans ined He was a shi+razer, in whose society I had two years before visited the ruins of Persepolis, Nakshi+ Rustam, and that fair city which was the birthplace of the poet Hafiz
To have travelled a long time with a man is in Asia looked upon as a sort of relationshi+p The gossiping shi+razer was delighted to see ed, whether or no, to submit to a quarter of an hour's halt, while we seated ourselves on the sand to enjoy together the friendly _kalian_ (Persian pipe) As its fragrant smoke rose before my eyes, vivid pictures of the past, of the one civilizations, arose before my memory How those recollections aniure of the proud Shapur, above hinificent bas-reliefs whirled kaleidoscope-like past my mind's eye; but their charms were multiplied as I reflected that since I saw them, I had seen, and left behind diana, which had inspired with terror the stout hearts of the Macedonians of Alexander
I was obliged to assure my shi+raz friend that I would speedily revisit his native country, for it was not until I had soothed him with this sort of promise that he would allow o on uing to ht we reached the station of _Sherif Abad_
This was the first evening I spent as a well-equipped traveller In ather firewood and collect flour; I had to pronounce prayers and blessings as payht quarters; and I was always liable to be turned out tired and hungry Now, on the contrary, I was a great man I rode proudly into the _tchaparkhane_ (post-house), and with a loud voice called for lodgings; for although I was still completely Oriental, so far as outward appearances went, the postmaster could easily observe that he had to do with one who had at his command a sufficiency of the sinews of war And ill not a Persian do for ar, fat,in abundance The eyes of ht of his former poverty and looked on the abundance which surrounded him If the supper which he could prepare was not exactly fit to appear on the table of a Lucullus, it was a very good one for a Persian wayside station
We had before us as our next day's work, a distance of nine Gerlish iah_ Nine fersakhs in Khorassan is a good deal, for there is a saying that in that province the miles are as interminable as the chatter of women, and that he who measured them must have done so with a broken chain European travellers, without exception, complain of the monotony and wearisome character of the road But as that to me who had escaped from the torments of Turkestan? Quite alone with my Tartar, and well armed and well mounted, I now for the first ti Little know they who coop thees, and find, perforce, delight in the dusty, griood saddle is better than all your stuffed cushi+ons Thereon a man feels himself free and unconstrained His bridle is his Bradshaw, his sword is his law, his gun is the policeaame for hies, laws, and custoh which he proceeds, and is independent of dragohtful Travelling the whole day in the open air, he finds the hour of midday halt both a pleasure and a necessity And then the enjoy arrived at the spot where henear hiazing at the crackling fire which is to cook his savoury supper! The rays of the setting sun are not then so bright and cheerful as the glances of the traveller's eyes No meal is so savoury as his supper, and his slumber under the starry canopy of heaven is a hundred ti than that of those who sleep on luxurious down in princely chaiah, the name of ious pilgrie, where pious faith discovers on a marble stone the print of Ali's foot Such miraculous footprints are by no means of rare occurrence in the East Christians, Mohammedans, and Brahmins, all hold them in equal veneration What especially excitedas they did rather the idea of the foot of an unwieldly elephant than that of a ious credulity does not trouble itself about such trifles as logic or the fitness of things In the mountains near shi+raz, for instance, there is a footprint three feet long; the one in Herat is of the same size, as is also that on Mount Sinai; and even in the distant Kothen, in Chinese Tartary, a large footprint is shohere, as the story goes, the holy Jafer once strolled near Sadik As I have observed, their monstrous size creates no surprise or doubt in the minds of the pious
Under the auspices of the holy place stand nurims In one of these I had co tea in the shade of the fine poplars, when one of the priests of the place made his appearance, and with a devout look invitedthe priest seemed to want at the time was a cup of tea, I treated him to one His further importunities proved him to have more mercenary views; so as the cold marble stone which contains the sacred footprint was of little interest to me, who had seen so many of its kind already, I contrived at the expense of a few krans (francs) to dispense at once with the society of ious duty
My third day's ion of low hills into the plain of Nishapur, so celebrated in Persia, and I he-i Nishabur (Plain of Nishapur) is in the eyes of the Persian the _ne plus ultra_ of beauty and wealth For hirant than elsewhere; its water the sweetest in the world, and its products without rivals in creation It is difficult adequately to describe the proud joy which is pictured in his countenance as he points out the hills lying towards the north-east, abounding in turquoise mines and precious metals For myself, I must own that the plain, like the city situated in itseffect I felt justified in anticipating Its historical importance would hardly have occurred to me, had it not been that a Persian, who discovered I was a foreigner, joined in conversation with geration the praises of his native city
No less inconsiderable did I find the town of Nishapur itself The bazaar is tolerably well filled with European and Persian wares, but the traveller in vain explores the town for remains of that wealth and architectural beauty which have been so highly lauded by Eastern historians The only things of note in the town are workshops for grinding and polishi+ng the turquoises found in the neighbourhood The stones in their unwrought state are of a gray colour, and only acquire their well-known sky-blue hue after repeated polishi+ngs The deeper its colour, the more prominent its shape, and the smoother its surface, so arded as flaws A curious phenomenon observable in these turquoises is that inpolished The inexperienced purchaser who is not aware of this circumstance not seldorims who have purchased in Nishapur stones of brilliant azure, have no other choice left them on their return home than to throw them away as faded and colourless At the present day these mines are by norented altogether for the low sum of two thousand ducats yearly The commerce in the stones, which was once actively carried on between Persia and Europe, especially with Russia, has also of late years very much fallen off
From Nishapur the road leads to Sebzevar, distant three days'stations have been often described No one who has travelled in Persia can have failed to have heard the naer and in strange tales of adventure Whoever a claiets to introduce their names into the story of his adventures Do you ask why? The answer is very sireat plain which extends far away into the steppes of the Turkomans No river, no mountain, breaks its uniformity, and as those rapacious children of the desert have but little respect for political boundaries, their predatory inroads are frequent, and these four places are just those which are ely by such incursions, as here runs the principal road towards Khorassan, which is ever full of heavily laden caravans and well-equipped pilgrims