and an inordinate estimate of personal beauty, are characteristic of the Persians,

His majesty, so rich in his female treasures, had a most contemptuous opinion of other monarchs not similarly wealthy, particularly of the king of England, when informed by Sir John Malcolm that he had only one wife. "What, only one wife ! — wallah!" Then, boasting of his own female establishment, how his majesty laughed! this was almost incredible to king and courtiers. "And he cannot say 'cut off his head,' when he likes, of any of his subjects?" To "his most despotic majesty" the thing seemed quite ridiculous!

At the morning salaam every individual may have access to the king, thus personally going to the fountain of justice, without treading the tortuous paths of courts of law. The king is always attended by the chief executioner, or "ferusha ghuzzub," literally "servant of anger and violence;" for a sudden spark of fiery indignation igniting the royal wrath, may call this officer immediately into action, to annihilate some of his subjects, who are "less than the dust in his presence."

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CHAPTER V.

THE PERSIAN "HAKEEMS," ETC.

THE lassitude of the Tehran climate in August (97 Farenheit, in the shade) induces disease, which sometimes engenders death; and a six weeks stretch on my mattress had prostrated my strength, and almost converted me into "food for worms;" but nature rallied, and the God of nature had decreed that I should not find a grave amongst the Moslems.

The table land on which Tehran is planted, subjects it to a sort of vertical exposure, from which one is almost tempted "to call on the rocks and mountains to cover one." The hot stifling air

rather diseases than refreshes the lungs, and the whole animal system falls prostrate before these noxious vapours. The principal inhabitants flock to the neighbouring villages at this season; and at a distance of three hours only, an extensive range of these villages, near the mountains of Shemiroun, offer delightfully cool retreats to the sicklied stranger.

At one of these villages, Kand, the British Elchee was encamped, whose courteous hospitality was so well known to all travellers. His Majesty went either to Camp or retired to the Nagaristan palace, accompanied by some of his wives and courtiers. The bazaars are then nearly the only districts occupied, and here the man of pelf would almost rather sink into the arms of plague than yield his money-getting occupation. But death stalked horribly around us in the city; scarcely a morning but the howl was heard, the frantic cries of the women bespoke boistrous but not permanent grief, and the doleful signal of the

muzzin," who announces from the roof of the mosque that another of Ali's followers had drunk of the sherbet of eternity," the ear was constantly dinned with the trophies of the great

destroyer, who "daily eats his millions at a meal."

New blood was at length engendered in my veins, and "anointed with the oil of resuscitation," sprang into my saddle, escaping as it were from a pest-house. Once more I opened my lungs, when without the city walls, and breathed new vitality. As "a bird out of the snare of the fowler," so did I make my escape. I was never more joyous than when emerging from the gates of Tehran, and was buoyant beyond my strength. The evening was beautiful, as seated in the ruined “baula khaneh” of the caravansery at Sulimania, I enjoyed the surrounding scene of garden ground, abundant in melons and other fruit, productions which in this district are so rich and flourishing. This abundance, arising from irrigation, is almost peculiar to Persia, the grateful soil the moment it is watered springs into bloom. Scratch the earth, drop the seed into it, and fruit soon follows.

Here I imprudently indulged in my favourite

There are professional mourners to be hired in Persia, who by wailing and weeping over the dead, are thus supposed to pay respect to their memory. I identify many of the Persian customs with those spoken of in the Bible. Thus, "Man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets."

musk melon, and dire were the consequences which followed. At Kasvine, the third stage, I was more than thrown back into my former physical debility; those gaunt-eyed monsters, ague and fever, soon made their approach; the journey fatigues, added to my fruit intemperance, produced a second edition of my Tehran sufferings.

What was to be done? to be laid up in a Persian caravansery, where the only accommodation was a brick cell, twelve feet by eight, in a state of complete nudity. How my weary bones ached, as stretched on my mattress I sought every possible reclinable position amidst the inquietudes of diarrhoea.

This is a disease which, though not peculiar to, is prevalent in this climate. I have no medical knowledge on the subject, but it appears to me to be an intestinal rebellion against even the necessaries of life.

To proceed was impossible; so I sent to implore the aid of the Mahomedan doctor, "Meerza Aboo Thaloub," the most renowned "hakeem" of the place. At six o'clock the next morning, a long bearded respectable looking gentleman walked into my cell, cautiously keeping its extreme dis