THE START FROM TEHERAN, ........ 1
CHAPTER II.
PERSIA AND THE MESHED PILGRIM ROAD, ...... 34
CHAPTER III.
PERSIA AND THE MESHED PILGRIM ROAD,...... 43
CHAPTER IV.
THROUGH KHORASSAN,.......... 65
CHAPTER V.
MESHED THE HOLY,.......... 84
CHAPTER VI.
THE UNBEATEN TRACKS Of KHORASSAN,...... 109
CHAPTER VII.
BEERJAND AND THE FRONTIER OF AFGHANISTAN, .. .. 135
CHAPTER VIII
ACROSS THE "DESERT OF DESPAIR,"....... 160
CHAPTER IX.
AFGHANISTAN,............ 181
CHAPTER X.
ARRESTED AT FURRAH,......... 197
CHAPTER XI.
UNDER ESCORT TO HERAT,......... 209
CHAPTER XII.
TAKEN BACK TO PERSIA,......... 230
CHAPTER XIII.
ROUNDABOUT TO INDIA,...... 255
CHAPTER XIV.
THROUGH INDIA,........... 284
CHAPTER XV.
DELHI AND AGRA,.......... 809
CHAPTER XVI.
FROM AGRA TO SINGAPORE,........ 833
CHAPTER XVII.
THROUGH CHINA,........... 365
CHAPTER XVIII.
DOWN THE KAN-KIANG VALLEY,........ 400
CHAPTER XIX.
THROUGH JAPAN,............ 432
CHAPTER XX.
THE HOME STRETCH,.......... 451
CAMBRIDGE, MASS., April 10, 1887.
FROM TEHERAN TO YOKOHAMA.
CHAPTER I.
THE START FROM TEHERAN.
The season of 1885-86 has been an exceptionally mild winter in the
Persian capital. Up to Christmas the weather was clear and bracing,
sufficiently cool to be comfortable in the daytime, and with crisp,
frosty weather at night. The first snow of the season commenced falling
while a portion of the English colony were enjoying a characteristic
Christmas dinner of roast-beef and plum-pudding, at the house of the
superintendent of the Indo-European Telegraph Station, and during January
and February, snow-storms, cold and drizzling rains alternated with brief
periods of clearer weather. When the sun shines from a cloudless sky in
Teheran, its rays are sometimes uncomfortably warm, even in midwinter; a
foot of snow may have clothed the city and the surrounding plain in a
soft, white mantle during the night, but, asserting his supremacy on the
following morning, he will unveil the gray nakedness of the stony plain
again by noon. The steadily retreating snow line will be driven back-back
over the undulating foot-hills, and some little distance up the rugged
slopes of the Elburz range, hard by, ere he retires from view in the
evening, rotund and fiery. This irregular snow-line has been steadily
losing ground, and retreating higher and higher up the mountain-slopes
during the latter half of February, and when March is ushered in, with
clear sunny weather, and the mud begins drying up and the various
indications of spring begin to put in their appearance, I decide to make
a start. Friends residing here who have been mentioning April 15th as the
date I should be justified in thinking the unsettled weather at an end
and pulling out eastward again, agree, in response to my anxious
inquiries, that it is an open spell of weather before the regular spring
rains, that may possibly last until I reach Meshed.
During the winter I have examined, as far as circumstances have
permitted, the merits and demerits of the different routes to the Pacific
Coast, and have decided upon going through Turkestan and Southern Siberia
to the Amoor Valley, and thence either follow down the valley to
Vladivostok or strike across Mongolia to Pekin--the latter route by
preference, if upon reaching Irkutsk I find it to be practicable; if not
practicable, then the Amoor Valley route from necessity. This route I
approve of, as it will not only take me through some of the most
interesting country in Asia, but will probably be a more straightaway
continuous land-journey than any other. The distance from Teheran to
Vladivostok is some six thousand miles, and, well aware that six thousand
miles with a bicycle over Asiatic roads is a task of no little magnitude,
I at once determine upon taking advantage of the fair March weather to
accomplish at least the first six hundred miles of the journey between
Teheran and Meshed, one of the holy cities of Persia.
The bicycle is in good trim, my own health is splendid, my experience of
nearly eight thousand miles of straightaway wheeling over the roads of
three continents ought to count for something, and it is with every
confidence of accomplishing my undertaking without serious misadventure
that I set about making my final preparations to start. The British
Charge d'Affaires gives me a letter to General Melnikoff, the Russian
Minister at the Shah's court, explaining the nature and object of my
journey, and asking him to render me whatever assistance he can to get
through, for most of the proposed route lies through Russian territory.
Among my Teheran friends is Mr. M------, a lively, dapper
little telegraphist, who knows three or four different languages, and who
never seems happier than when called upon to act the part of interpreter
for friends about him.
Among other distinguishing qualities, Mr. M------shines in
Teheran society as the only Briton with sufficient courage to wear a
chimney-pot hat. Although the writer has seen the "stove-pipe" of the
unsuspecting tenderfoot from the Eastern States made short work of in a
far Western town, and the occurrence seemed scarcely to be out of place
there, I little expected to find popular sentiment running in the same
warlike groove, and asserting itself in the same destructive manner in
the little English community at Teheran. Such, however, is the grim fact,
and I have ventured to think that after this there is no disputing the
common destiny of us Anglo-Saxons, whatever clime, country, or government
may at present claim us as its own. Having seen this unfortunate
headgear of our venerable and venerated forefathers shot as full of
holes as a colander in the West, I come to the East only to find it
subjected to similar indignities here. I happen to be present at the
wanton destruction of Mr. M------'s second or third importation from
England, see it taken ruthlessly from his head, thrust through and
through with a sword-stick, and then made to play the unhappy and
undignified part of a football so long as there is anything left to kick
at. More than our common language, methinks--more than common customs and
traditions--more than all those characteristic traits that distinguish us
in common, and at the same time also distinguish us from all other
peoples--more than anything else, does this mutual spirit of
destructiveness, called into play by the sight of a stove-pipe hat, prove
the existence of a strong, resistless undercurrent of sympathy that is
carrying the most distant outposts of Anglo-Saxony merrily down the
stream of time together, to some particular end; perchance a glorious
end, perchance an ignominious end, but certainly to an end that will not
wear a stove-pipe hat.
Mr. M------'s linguistic accomplishments include a fair
knowledge of Russian, and he readily accompanies me to the Russian
Legation to interpret. The Russian Legation is situated down in the old
Oriental quarter (birds of a feather, etc.) of the city, and, for us at
least, necessitated the employment of a guide to find it. On the way
down, Mr. M------, who prides himself on a knowledge of
Russian character, impresses upon me his assurance that General Melnikoff
will turn out to be a nice, pleasant sort of a gentleman. "All the
better-class Russians are delightfully jolly and agreeable, much more
agreeable to have dealings with than the same class of people of any
other country," he says, and with these favorable comments we reach the
legation and send up my letter. After waiting what we both consider an
unnecessarily long time in the vestibule, a full-faced, sensual-looking,
or, in other words, well-to-do Persian-looking individual, in the full
costume of a Persian nobleman, comes out, bearing my letter unopened in
his hand. Bestowing upon us a barely perceptible nod, he walks straight
on past, jumps into a carriage at the door, and is driven off.
Mr. M------looks nonplussed at me, and I suppose I looked
equally nonplussed at him; anyhow, he proceeds to relieve his feelings in
language anything but complimentary to the Russian Minister. He's
the--well, I've met scores of Russians, but--him, queer! I
never saw a Russian act half as queer as this before, never!"
"Small prospect of getting any assistance from this quarter," I suggest.
"Seems deucedly like it," assents Mr. M------. "I said,
just now, that, being a Russian, he was sure to be courteous and
agreeable, if nothing else; but it seems as if there are exceptions to
this rule as to others;" and, talking together, we try to find
consolation in the thought that he may be merely eccentric, and turn out
a very good sort of fellow after all. While thus commenting, a liveried
servant presents himself and motions for us to follow him in the wake of
the departing carriage. Following his guidance a short distance through
the streets, he leads us into the court-yard of a splendid Persian
mansion, delivers us into the charge of another liveried servant, who
conducts us up a broad flight of marble stairs, at the top of which he
delivers us into the hands of yet a third flunky, who now escorts us into
the most gorgeously mirrored room it has ever been my fortune to see. The
apartment is perfectly dazzling in its glittering splendor; the floor is
of highly polished marble, the walls consist of mirror-work entirely, as
also does the lofty, domed ceiling; not plain, large squares of
looking-glass, but mirrored surfaces of all shapes and sizes, pitched at
every conceivable angle, form niches, panels, and geometrical designs--yet
each separate piece plays well its part in working out the harmonious and
decidedly pretty effect of the whole. All the furniture the large
apartment boasts is a crimson-and-gold divan or two, a few strips of rich
carpet, and an ebony stand-table, inlaid with mother-of-pearl; but
suspended from the ceiling are several magnificent cut-glass chandeliers.
At night, when these Persian mirrored rooms are lit up, they present a
scene of barbaric splendor well calculated to delight the eye of the
sumptuous Oriental; every tiny square of glass reflects a point of light,
and every larger one reproduces a chandelier; for every lamp he lights,
the Persian voluptuary finds himself surrounded by a thousand.
Seated on a divan toward one end of this splendid room, with an open box
of cigarettes before him, is the man who a few minutes ago passed us by
on the other side and drove off in his carriage. Offering us cigarettes,
he bids us be seated, and then, in very fair English (for he has once
been Persian Minister to England), introduces himself as "Nasr-i-Mulk,"
the Shah's Minister for Foreign Affairs; the same gentleman, it will be
remembered, to whom I was introduced on the morning of my appearance
before the Shah. (Vol. I.) I readily recognize him now, and he recognizes
me, and asks me when I am going to leave Teheran; but in the gloomy
vestibule of the other palace, my own memory of his face and figure was
certainly at fault. It turns out, after all, that the wretch whom we paid
to guide us to the Russian Legation, in his ignorance guided us into the
Persian Foreign Office.
"I knew--yes, dash it all! I knew he wasn't the Russian Minister the
moment I saw him," says Mr. M------as we take our departure from the
glittering room. His confidence in his knowledge of Russian character,
which a moment ago had dropped down to zero, revives wonderfully upon
discovering our ludicrous mistake, and, small as he is, it is all I can
do to keep up with him as we follow the guide Nasr-i-Mulk has kindly sent
to show us to the Russian Legation. A few minutes' walk brings us to our
destination, where we find, in the person of General Melnikoff, a
gentleman possessing the bland and engaging qualities of a good
diplomatist in a most eminent degree.
"Which is Mr. Stevens?" he exclaims, with something akin to enthusiasm,
as he advances almost to the door to meet us, his face fairly beaming
with pleasure; and, grasping me warmly by the hand, he proceeds to
express his great satisfaction at meeting a person, who had "made so
wonderful a journey," etc., etc., and etc. Never did Mr. Pickwick beam
more pleasantly at the deaf gentleman, or regard more benignantly Master
Humphrey's clock, than the Russian Minister regards the form and features
of one whom, he says, he feels "honored to meet." For several minutes we
discuss, through the medium of Mr. M------, my journey from San Francisco
to Teheran, and its proposed continuation to the Pacific; and during the
greater part, of the interview General Melnikoff holds me quite
affectionately by the hand. "Wonderful!" he says, "wonderful! nobody ever
made half such a remarkable journey; my whole heart will go with you
until your journey is completed."
Mr. M------looks on and interprets between us, with a fixed and confident
didn't-I-tell-you-so smile, that forms a side study of no mean quality.
"There will be no trouble about getting permission to go through
Turkestan?" I feel constrained to inquire; for such excessive display of
affection and bonhommie on the Russian diplomat's part could scarce fail
to arouse suspicions. "Oh dear, no!" he replies. "Oh dear, no! I will
telegraph to General Komaroff, at Askabad, to remove all obstacles, so
that nothing shall interfere with your progress." Having received this
positive assurance, we take our leave, Mr. M-------reminding me gleefully
of what he had said about the Russians being the most agreeable people on
earth, and the few remaining clouds of doubt about getting the road
through Turkestan happily dissipated by the Russian Minister's assurances
of assistance.
Searching through the bazaar, I succeed, after some little trouble, in
finding and purchasing a belt-full of Russian gold, sufficient to carry
me clear through to Japan; and on the morning of March 10th I bid
farewell to the Persian capital, well satisfied at the outlook ahead.
While packing up my traps on the evening before starting, it begins
raining for the first time in ten days; but it clears off again before
midnight, and the morning opens bright and promising as ever. Six members
of the telegraph staff have determined to accompany me out to
Katoum-abad, the first chapar-station on the Meshed pilgrim road, a
distance of seven farsakhs. "Hodge-podge," the cook, and Meshedi Ali, the
gholam, were sent ahead yesterday with plenty of substantial refreshments
and sun-dry mysterious black bottles--for it is the intention of the
party to remain at Katoum-abad overnight, and give me a proper send-off
from that point to-morrow morning.
Some little delay is occasioned by a difficulty in meeting the fastidious
tastes of some of the party as regards saddle-horses; but there is no
particular hurry, and ten o'clock finds me bowling briskly through the
suburbs toward the Doshan Tepe gate, with four Englishmen, an Irishman,
and a Welshman cantering merrily along on horseback behind.
"Khuda rail pak Kumad!" (May God sweep your road!), All Akbar had
exclaimed as I mounted at the door, and as we pass through the city gate
the old sentinel, when told that I am at last starting on the promised
journey to Meshed on the asp-i-awhan, supplements this with "Padaram
daromad!" (My father has come out!), a Persian metaphorical exclamation,
signifying that such wonderful news has had the effect of calling his
father from the grave.
The weather has changed again since early morning; it is evidently in a
very fitful and unsettled mood; the gray clouds are swirling in confusion
about the white summit of Demavend as we emerge on the level plain
outside the ramparts, and fleecy fugitives are scudding southward in wild
haste. Imperfect but ridable donkey-trails follow the dry moat around to
the Meshed road, which takes a straight course southeastward from the
city and is seen in the distance ahead, leading over a sloping pass, a
depression in the Doshan Tepe spur of the Elburz range. The road near the
city is now in better condition for wheeling than at any other time of
the year; the daily swarms of pack-animals bringing produce into Teheran
have trodden it smooth and hard during the ten days' continuous fine
weather, while it has not been dry sufficiently long to develop into
dust, as it does later in the season. Our road is level and good for
something over a farsakh, after which comes the rising ground leading
gently upward to the pass. The gradient is sufficiently gentle to be
ridable for some little distance, when it becomes too rocky and steep,
and I have to dismount and trundle to the summit. The summit of the pass
is only about nine miles from the city walls, and we pause a minute to
investigate a bottle of homemade wine from the private cellar of Mr.
North, one of our party, and to allow me to take a farewell glance at
Teheran, and the many familiar objects round about, ere riding down the
eastern slope and out of sight.
Teheran is in semi-obscurity beneath the same hazy veil observed when
first approaching it from the west, and which always seems to hover over
it. This haziness is not sufficiently pronounced to hide any conspicuous
building, and each familiar object in the city is plainly visible from
the commanding summit of the pass. The different gates of the city, each
with its little cluster of bright-tiled minars, trace at a glance the
size and contour of the outer ditch and wall; the large framework of the
pavilion beneath which the Shah gives his annual tazzia (representation
of the religious tragedy of Hussein and Hassan), denuded of its canvas
covering, suggests from this distance the naked ribs of some monster
skeleton. The square towers of the royal anderoon--which the Shah
professes to believe is the tallest dwelling-house in the
world--loom conspicuously skyward above the mass of indefinable mud
buildings and walls that characterize the habitations of humbler folk,
but perhaps happier on the whole than the fair occupants of that
seven-storied gilded prison.
Hundreds of women-wives, concubines, slaves, and domestics are understood
to be dwelling within these palace walls in charge of sable eunuchs, and
the fate of any female whose bump of discretion in an evil moment fails
her, is to be hurled headlong from the summit of one of the anderoon
towers--such, at least, is the popular belief in Teheran; it may or
may not be an exaggeration. Some even assert that the Shah's chief object
in building the anderoon so high was to have the certainty of this awful
doom ever present before its numerous inmates, the more easily to keep
them in a submissive frame of mind. Off to the right, below our position,
is the Doshan Tepe palace, a memorable spot for me, where I had the
satisfaction of first introducing bicycle-riding to the notice of the
Persian monarch. Off to the left, the Parsee "tower of silence" is
observed perched among the lonely gray hills far from human habitation or
any traversed road; on a grating fixed in the top of this tower, the
Guebre population of Teheran deposit their dead, in order that the
carrion-crows and the vultures may pick the carcass clean before they
deposit the whitened bones in the body of the tower.
Having duly investigated the bottle of wine and noticed these few
familiar objects, we all remount and begin the descent. It is a gentle
declivity from top to bottom, and ridable the whole distance, save where
an occasional washout or other small obstacle compels a dismount. The
wind is likewise favorable, and from the top of the pass the bicycle
outdistances the horsemen, except two who are riding exceptionally good
nags and make a special effort to keep up; and at two o'clock we arrive
at Katoum-abad. Katoum-abad consists of a small mud village and a
half-ruined brick caravansarai; in one of the rooms of the latter we find
"Hodge-podge" and Me-shedi Ali, with an abundance of roast chickens, cold
mutton, eggs, and the before-mentioned mysterious black bottles.
The few Persian travellers in the caravansarai and the villagers come
flocking around as usual to worry me about riding the bicycle, but the
servants drive them away in short order. "We want to see the sahib ride
the aap-i-awhan," they explain,-no doubt thinking their request most
natural and reasonable. "The sahib won't let you see it, nor ride on it
this evening," reply the servants; and, given to understand that we won't
put up with their importunities, they worry us no more. "Oh, that I could
get rid of them thus readily always!" I mentally exclaim; for I feel
instinctively that the farther east I get, the more wretchedly worrying
and inquisitive I shall find the people. We arrive hungry and thirsty,
and in condition to do ample justice to the provisions at hand. After
satisfying the pressing needs of hunger, we drink several appropriate
toasts from the contents of the mysterious black bottles--toasts for the
success of my journey, and to the bicycle that has stood by me so well
thus far on my journey, and promises to stand by me equally as well for
the future.
About four o'clock two of the company, who have been thoughtful enough to
bring shotguns along, sally forth in quest of ducks. They come plodding
wearily back again shortly after dark, without any game, but with deep
designs on the credulity of the non-sporting members of the company. In
reply to the general and stereotyped query, "Shoot anything?" one of the
erring pair replies, "Yes, we shot several canvas-backs, but lost them in
the reeds; didn't we, old un?" "Yes, five," promptly asserts "old un," a
truthful young man of about three-and-twenty summers. After this, the
silence for the space of a minute is so profound that we can hear each
other think, until one of the company, acting as spokesman for the silent
reflections of the others, inquires, "Anybody know of any reeds about
Katoum-abad?" Some one is about to reply, but sportsman No. 1 artfully
waives further examination by heaping imprecations on the unkempt head of
a dervish, who at this opportune moment commences a sing-song monotone,
in a most soul-harrowing key, outside our menzil doorway.
A slight drizzling rain is falling when the early riser of the company
wakes up and peeps out at daybreak next morning, but it soon ceases, and
by seven o'clock the ground is quite dry. The road for a mile or so is
too lumpy to admit of mounting, as is frequently the case near a village,
and my six companions accompany me to ridable ground. As I mount and
wheel away, they wave hats and send up three ringing cheers and a
"tiger," hurrahs that roll across the gray Persian plain to the echoing
hills, the strangest sound, perhaps, these grim old hills have ever
echoed; certainly, they never before echoed an English cheer.
And now, as my friends of the telegraph staff turn about and wend their
way back to Teheran, is as good a time as any to mention briefly the
manner in which these genial lightning-jerkers assisted to render my five
months' sojourn in the Persian capital agreeable. But a few short hours
after my arrival in Teheran, I was sought out by Messrs. Meyrick and
North, who no sooner learned of my intention to winter here, than they
extended a cordial invitation to join them in their already established
bachelors' quarters, where four disconsolate halves of humanity were
already messing harmoniously together. With them I took up my quarters,
and, under the liberal and wholesome gastronomic arrangements of the
establishment, soon acquired my usual semi-embon-point condition, and
recovered from that gaunt, hungry appearance that the hardships and scant
fare of the journey from Constantinople had imparted. The house belonged
to Mr. North, and he managed to give me a little room to myself for
literary work, and, under the influence of a steady stream of letters and
papers from friends and well-wishers in England and America, that snug
little apartment, with a round, moon-like hole in the thick mud wall for
a window, soon acquired the den-like aspect that seems inseparable from
the occupation of distributing ink.
Three native servants cooked for us, waited on us, turned up missing when
wanted for anything particular, cheated us and each other, swore eternal
honesty and fidelity to our faces, called us infidel dogs and pedar sags
behind our backs, quarrelled daily among themselves over their modokal
(legitimate pickings and stealings--ten per cent, on everything
passing through their hands), and meekly bore with any abuse bestowed
gratuitously upon them, for an aggregate of one hundred and thirty kerans
a month--and, of course, their modokal. Some enterprising members of
the colony had formed themselves into a club, and imported a
billiard-table from England; this, also, was installed in Mr. North's
house, and it furnished the means for many an hour of pleasant diversion.
Like all Persian houses, the house was built around a square court-yard.
Mr. North had also a pair of small white bull-dogs, named, respectively,
"Crib" and "Swindle." The last-named animal furnished us with quite an
exciting episode one February evening. He had been acting rather
strangely for two or three days; we thought that one of the servants had
been giving him a dose of bhang in revenge for having worried his kitten,
and that he would soon recover; but on this particular day, when out for
a run with his owner, his strange behavior took the form of leaping
impulsively at Mr. North, and, with seemingly wild frolic, seizing and
shaking his garments. When Mr. North returned home he took the
precautionary measure of chaining him up in the yard. Shortly afterward,
I came in from my customary evening walk, and, all unconscious of the
change in his behavior, went up to him; with a half-playful, half-savage
spring he seized the leg of my trousers, and, with an evidently
uncontrollable impulse, shook a piece clean out of it. He became
gradually worse as the evening wore away; the wild expression of his eyes
developed in an alarming manner; he would try to get at any person who
showed himself, and he made night hideous with the fearful barking howl
of a mad dog. Poor Swindle had gone mad; and I had had a narrow escape
from being bitten. We lassoed him from opposite directions and dragged
him outside and shot him. Swindle was a plucky little dog, and so was
Crib; one day they chased a vagrant cat up on to the roof; driven to
desperation, the cat made a wild leap down into the court-yard, a
distance of perhaps twenty feet; without a moment's hesitation, both dogs
sprang boldly after her, recking little of the distance to the ground and
the possibility of broken bones.
Sometimes the colony drives dull care and ennui away by indulging in
private theatricals; this winter they organized an amateur company,
called themselves the "Teheran Bulbuls," and, with burnt-corked faces and
grotesque attire, they rehearsed and perfected themselves in "Uncle
Ebenezer's Visit to New York," which, together with sundry duets, solos,
choruses, etc., they proposed to give, an entertainment for the benefit
of the poor of the city. When the Shah returned from Europe, he was moved
by what he had seen there to build a small theatre; the theatre was
built, but nothing is ever done with it. The Teheran Bulbuls applied for
its use to give their entertainment in, and the Shah was pleased to grant
their request. The mollahs raised objections; they said it would have a
tendency to corrupt the morals of the Persians. Once, twice, the
entertainment was postponed; but the Shah finally overruled the bigoted
priests' objections, and "Uncle Ebenezer's Visit to New York" was played
twice in Nasr-e-Deen's little gilded theatre a few days after I left,
with great success; the first night, before the Shah and his nobles and
the foreign ambassadors, and the second night before more common folk.
The two postponements and my early departure prevented me from being on
hand as prompter. The winter before, these dusky-faced "bul-buls" had
performed before a Teheran audience, and one who was a member at that
time tells an amusing story of the individual who acted as prompter on
that occasion. One of the performers appeared on the stage sufficiently
charged with stage-fright to cause him to entirely forget his piece.
Expecting every moment to get the cue from the prompter's box, what was
his horror to hear, after waiting what probably seemed to him about an
hour, instead of the cue, in a hoarse whisper that could be distinctly
heard all over the room, the comforting remark, "I say, Charlie, I've
lost the blooming place!"
The American missionaries have a small chapel in Teheran, and on Sunday
morning we sometimes used to go; the little congregation gathered there
was composed of strange elements collected together from far-off places.
From Colonel F ______, the grizzled military adventurer, now in the
Shah's service, and who was also with Maximilian in Mexico, to the young
American lady who is said to have turned missionary and come,
broken-hearted, to the distant East because her lover had died a few days
before they were to be married, they are an audience of people each with
a more or less adventurous history. It is perfectly natural that it
should be so; it is the irrepressible spirit of adventure that is either
directly or indirectly responsible for their presence here.
Half an hour after the echoes of the three cheers and the "tiger" have
died away finds me wet-footed and engaged in fording a series of
aggravating little streams, that obstruct my path so frequently that to
stop and shed one's foot-gear for each soon becomes an intolerable
nuisance. I should think I can lay claim, without exaggeration, to
crossing fifty of these streams inside of ten miles. A good-sized stream
emerges from the Elburz foot-hills; after reaching the plain it follows
no regular channel, but spreads out like an open fan into a gradually
widening area of small streams, that play their part in irrigating a few
scattering fields and gardens, and are then lost in the sands of the
desert to the south. Situated where it can derive the most benefit from
these streams is the village of Sherifabad, and beyond Sherifabad
stretches a verdureless waste to Aivan-i-Kaif. On this desert, I sit
down, for a few minutes, on one of those little mounds of stones piled up
at intervals to mark the road when the trail is buried beneath the winter
snows; a green-turbaned descendant of the Prophet, bestriding a bay
horse, comes from the opposite direction, stops, dismounts, squats down
on his hams close by, and proceeds to regale himself with bread and figs,
meanwhile casting fugitive glances at the bicycle. Presently he advances
closer, gives me a handful of figs, squats down closer to the bicycle,
and commences a searching investigation of its several parts.
"Where are you going?" he finally asks. "Meshed." "Where have you come
from?" "Teheran." With that he hands me another handful of figs,
remounts his horse, and rides away without another word. Inquisitiveness
is seen almost bristling from the loose sleeves and flowing folds of his
sky-blue gown, but his over-whelming sense of his own holiness forbids
him holding anything like a lengthy intercourse with an unhallowed
Ferenghi, and, much as he would like to know everything about the
bicycle, he goes away without asking a single question about it.
Shortly after parting company with the sanctimonious seyud, I encounter a
prosperous-looking party of dervishes. Some of them are mounted on
excellent donkeys, and for dervishes they look exceptionally flourishing
and well to do. As I ride slowly past, they accost me with their
customary "huk yah huk," and promise to pray Allah for a safe journey to
wherever I am going, if I will only favor them with the necessary
backsheesh to command their good offices.
There are some stretches of very good road across this desert, and I
reach Aivan-i-Kaif near noon. There has been no drinkable water for a
long distance, and, being thirsty, my first inquiry is for tea. "There is
a tchai-khan at the umbar (water-cistern), yonder," I am told, and
straightway proceed to the place pointed out; but "tchai-khan neis" is
the reply upon inquiring at the umbar. In this manner am I promptly
initiated into one peculiarity of the people along this portion of the
Meshed pilgrim road, a peculiarity that distinguishes them from the
ordinary Persian as fully as the shaking of their heads for an
affirmative reply does the people of the Maritza Valley from other people
of the Balkan Peninsula. They will frequently ask you if you want a
certain article, simply for the purpose of telling you they haven't got
it. Whether this queer inconsistency comes of simon-pure inquisitiveness,
to hear what one will say in reply, or whether they derive a certain
amount of inquisitorial pleasure from raising a person's expectations one
moment so as to witness his disappointment the next, is a question I
prefer to leave to others, but more than once am I brought into contact
with this peculiarity during the few brief hours I stay at Aivan-i-Kaif.
It is not improbable that these people are merely carrying their ideas of
politeness to the insane length of holding out the promise of what they
think or ascertain one wants, knowing at the same time their inability to
supply it.
It is threatening rain as I pick my way through a mile or so of mud
ruins, tumble-down walls, and crooked paths, leading from the umbar to
the house of the Persian telegraph-jee, who has been requested, from
Teheran, to put me up, and, in view of the threatening aspect of the
weather, I conclude to remain till morning. The English Government has
taken charge of the Teheran and Meshed telegraph-line, during the
delimitation of the Afghan and Turkestan boundary, and, besides
guaranteeing the native telegraph-jees their regular salary-which is not
always forthcoming from the Persian Government-they pay them something
extra. In consequence of this, the telegraph-jees are at present very
favorably disposed toward Englishmen, and Mirza Hassan readily tenders me
the hospitality of the little mud office where he amuses himself daily
clicking the keys of his instrument, smoking kalians, drinking tea, and
entertaining his guests. Mr. Mclntire and Mr. Stagno are somewhere
between here and Meshed, inspecting and repairing the line for the
English Government, for they received it from the Persians in a wretched,
tumble-down condition, and Mr. Gray, telegraphist for the Afghan Boundary
Commission, is stationed temporarily at Meshed, so that, thanks to the
boundary troubles, I am pretty certain of meeting three Europeans on the
first six hundred miles of my journey.
Mirza Hassan is hospitable and well meaning, but, like most Persians, he
is slow about everything but asking questions. Being a telegraph-jee, he
is, of course, a comparatively enlightened mortal, and, among other
things, he is acquainted with the average Englishman's partiality for
beer. One of the first questions he asks, is whether I want any beer. It
strikes me at once as a rather strange question to be asked in a Persian
village, but, thinking he might perchance have had a bottle or two left
here by one of the above-mentioned telegraph-inspectors, I signify my
willingness to sample a little. True to the peculiar inconsistency of his
fellows, he replies: "Ob-i-jow neis" (beer, no). If he hasn't ob-i-jow,
however, he has tea, and in about an hour after my arrival he produces
the samovar, a bowl of sugar, and the tiny glasses in which tea is always
served in Persia.
Visitors begin dropping in as usual, and, before long, hundreds of
villagers are swarming about the telegraph-khana, anxious to see me ride.
It is coming on to rain, but, in order to rid the telegraph-office of the
crowd, I take the bicycle out. Willing men carry both me and the bicycle
across a stream that runs through the village, to smooth ground on the
opposite side, where I ride back and forth several times, to the wild and
boisterous delight of the entire population.
In this manner I succeed in ridding the telegraph-office of the crowd;
but there is no getting rid of the visitors. Everybody in the place who
thinks himself a little better than the ragamuffin ryots comes and squats
on his hams in the little hut-like office, sips the telegraph-jee's
sweetened tea, smokes his kalians, and spends the afternoon in staring
wonderingly at me and the bicycle. Having picked up a little Persian
during the winter, I am able to talk with them, and understand them,
rather better than last season, and, Persian-like, they ply me
mercilessly with questions. Often, when some one asks a question of me,
Mirza Hassan, as becomes a telegraphies, and a person of profound
erudition, thoughtfully saves me the trouble of replying by undertaking
to furnish the desired information himself. One old mollah wants to know
how many farsakhs it is from Aivan-i-Kaif to Yenghi Donia (New
World-America); ere I can frame a suitable reply, Mirza Hassan forestalls
my intentions by answering, in a decisive tone of voice that admits of no
appeal, "Khylie!" "Khylie" is a handy word that the Persians always fall
back on when their knowledge of great numbers or long distances is vague
and shadowy; it is an indefinite term, equivalent to our word "many."
Mirza Hassan does not know whether America is two hundred farsakhs away
or two thousand, but he knows it to be "khylie farsakhs," and that is
perfectly satisfactory to himself, and the white-turbaned questioner is
perfectly satisfied with "khylie" for an answer.
A person from the New World is naturally a rara avis with the simple
villagers of Aivan-i-Kaif, and their inquisitiveness concerning Yenghi
Donia and Yenghi Donians fairly runs riot, and shapes itself into all
manner of questions. They want to know whether the people smoke kalians
and ride horses--real horses, not asps-i-awhans-in Yenghi Donia, and
whether the Valiat smoked the kalian with me at Hadji Agha. Mirza Hassan
explains about the kalian and horses; he enlightens his wondering
auditors to the extent that Yenghi Donians smoke nargilehs and chibouques
instead of kalians, and he contemptuously pooh-poohs the idea of them
keeping riding-horses when they are clever enough to make iron horses
that require nothing to eat or drink and no rest. About the question of
the Heir Apparent smoking the kalian with me he betrays as lively an
interest as anybody in the room, but he maintains a discreet silence
until I answer in the negative, when he surveys his guests with the air
of one who pities their ignorance, and says, "Kalian neis."
A lusty-lunged youngster of about three summers has been interrupting the
genial flow of conversation by making "Rome howl" in an adjoining room,
and Mirza Hassan fetches him in and consoles him with sundry lumps of
sugar. The advent of the limpid-eyed toddler leads the thoughts and
questions of the company into more domestic channels. After exhaustive
questioning about my own affairs, Mirza Hassan, with more than
praiseworthy frankness and becoming gravity, informs me that, besides the
embryo telegraphjee and sugar-consumer in the room, he is the happy
father of "yek nim" (one and a half others). I cast my eye around the
room at this extraordinary announcement, expecting to find the company
indulging in appreciative smiles, but every person in the room is as
sober as a judge; plainly, I am the only person present who regards the
announcement as anything uncommon.
After an ample supper of mutton pillau, Mirza Hassan proceeds to say his
prayers, borrowing my compass to get the proper bearings for Mecca, which
I have explained to him during the afternoon. With no little dismay he
discovers that, according to my explanations, he has for years been
bobbing his head daily several degrees east of the holy city, and, like a
sensible fellow, and a person who has become convinced of the
infallibility of telegraph instruments, compasses, and kindred aids to
the accomplishment of human ends, he now rectifies the mistake.
Everybody along this route uses a praying-stone, a small cake of stone or
hardened clay, containing an inscription from the Koran. These
praying-stones are obtained from the sacred soil of Meshed, Koom, or
Kerbela, and are placed in position on the ground in front of the
kneeling devotee during his devotions, so that, instead of touching his
forehead to the carpet or the common ground of his native village, he can
bring it in contact with the hallowed soil of one of these holy cities.
Distance lends enchantment to a holy place, and adds to the efficacy of a
prayer-stone in the eyes of its owner, and they are valued highly or
lightly according to the distance and the consequent holiness of the city
they are brought from. For example, a Meshedi values a prayer-stone from
Kerbela, and a Kerbeli values one from Meshed, neither of them having
much faith in the efficacy of one from his own city; familiarity with
sacred things apparently breeds doubts and indifference. The prayer-stone
is reverently touched to lips, cheeks, and forehead at the finish of
prayers, and then carefully wrapped up and stowed away until praying-time
comes round again. To a sceptical and perhaps irreverent observer, these
praying-stones would seem to bear about the same relation to a pilgrimage
to Meshed or Kerbela as a package of prepared sea-salt does to a season
at the sea-side.