Chapter 6

On the morning of July 8, in company with a body-guard of zaptiehs, which the mutessarif forced upon us, we wheeled down from the ruined embattlements of Bayazid. The assembled rabble raised a lusty cheer at parting. An hour later we had surmounted the Kazlee Gool, and the “land of Iran” was before us. At our feet lay the Turco-Persian battle-plains of Chaldiran, spreading like a desert expanse to the parched barren hills beyond, and dotted here and there with clumps of trees in the village oases. And this, then, was the land where, as the poets say, “the nightingale sings, and the rose-tree blossoms,” and where “a flower is crushed at every step!” More truth, we thought, in the Scotch traveler’s description, which divides Persia into two portions—“One desert with salt, and the other desert without salt.” In time we came to McGregor’s opinion as expressed in his description of Khorassan. “We should fancy,” said he, “a small green circle round every village indicated on the map, and shade all the rest in brown.” The mighty hosts whose onward sweep from the Indus westward was checked only by the Grecian phalanx upon the field of Marathon must have come from the scattered ruins around, which reminded us that “Iran was; she is no more.” Those myriad ranks of Yenghiz Khan and Tamerlane brought death and desolation from Turan to Iran, which so often met to act and react upon one another that both are now only landmarks in the sea of oblivion.

Our honorary escort accompanied us several miles over the border to the Persian village of Killissakend, and there committed us to the hospitality of the district khan, with whom we managed to converse in the Turkish language, which, strange to say, we found available in all the countries that lay in our transcontinental pathway as far as the great wall of China. Toward evening we rode in the garden of the harem of the khan, and at daybreak the next morning were again in the saddle. By a very early start we hoped to escape the burden of excessive hospitality; in other words, to get rid of an escort that was an expensive nuisance. At the next village we were confronted by what appeared to be a shouting, gesticulating maniac. On dismounting, we learned that a harbinger had been sent by the khan, the evening before, to have a guard ready to join us as we passed through. In fact, two armed _ferashes_ were galloping toward us, armed, as we afterward learned, with American rifles, and the usual _kamma_, or huge dagger, swinging from a belt of cartridges. These fellows, like the zaptiehs, were fond of ostentation. They frequently led us a roundabout way to show us off to their relatives or friends in a neighboring village. Nature at last came to our deliverance. As we stood on a prominent ridge taking a last look at Mount Ararat, now more than fifty miles away, a storm came upon us, showering hailstones as large as walnuts. The ferashes with frantic steeds dashed ahead to seek a place of shelter, and we saw them no more.

Five days in Persia brought us to the shores of Lake Ooroomeeyah, the saltest body of water in the world. Early the next morning we were wading the chilly waters of the Hadji Chai, and a few hours later found us in the English consulate at Tabreez, where we were received by the Persian secretary. The English government, it seemed, had become embroiled in a local love-affair just at a time when Colonel Stewart was off on “diplomatic duty” on the Russian Transcaspian border. An exceptionally bright Armenian beauty, a graduate of the American missionary schools at this place, had been abducted, it was claimed, by a young Kurdish cavalier, and carried away to his mountain home. Her father, who happened to be a naturalized English subject, had applied for the assistance of his adopted country in obtaining her release. Negotiations were at once set on foot between London and Teheran, which finally led to a formal demand upon the Kurds by the Shah himself. Upon their repeated refusal, seven thousand Persian troops, it was said, were ordered to Soak Boulak, under the command of the vice-consul, Mr. Patton. The matter at length assumed such an importance as to give rise, in the House of Commons, to the question, “Who is Katty Greenfield?” This, in time, was answered by that lady herself, who declared under oath that she had become a Mohammedan, and was in love with the man with whom she had eloped. More than this, it was learned that she had not a drop of English blood in her veins, her father being an Austrian, and her mother a native Armenian. Whereupon the Persian troopers, with their much disgusted leader, beat an inglorious retreat, leaving “Katty Greenfield” mistress of the situation, and of a Kurdish heart.

In Tabreez there is one object sure to attract attention. This is the “Ark,” or ancient fortified castle of the Persian rulers. High on one of the sides, which a recent earthquake has rent from top to bottom, there is a little porch whence these Persian “Bluebeards,” or rather Redbeards, were wont to hurl unruly members of the harem. Under the shadow of these gloomy walls was enacted a tragedy of this century. Babism is by no means the only heresy that has sprung from the speculative genius of Persia; but it is the one that has most deeply moved the society of the present age, and the one which still obtains, though in secret and without a leader. Its founder, Seyd Mohammed Ali, better known as Bab, or “Gate,” promulgated the doctrine of anarchy to the extent of “sparing the rod and spoiling the child,” and still worse, perhaps, of refusing to the ladies no finery that might be at all becoming to their person. While not a communist, as he has sometimes been wrongly classed, he exhorted the wealthy to regard themselves as only trustees of the poor. With no thought at first of acquiring civil power, he and his rapidly increasing following were driven to revolt by the persecuting mollas, and the sanguinary struggle of 1848 followed. Bab himself was captured, and carried to this “most fanatical city of Persia,” the burial-place of the sons of Ali. On this very spot a company was ordered to despatch him with a volley; but when the smoke cleared away, Bab was not to be seen. None of the bullets had gone to the mark, and the bird had flown—but not to the safest refuge. Had he finally escaped, the miracle thus performed would have made Babism invincible. But he was recaptured and despatched, and his body thrown to the canine scavengers.

_Tabreez_ (fever-dispelling) was a misnomer in our case. Our sojourn here was prolonged for more than a month by a slight attack of typhoid fever, which this time seized Sachtleben, and again the kind nursing of the missionary ladies hastened recovery. Our mail, in the mean time, having been ordered to Teheran, we were granted the privilege of intercepting it. For this purpose we were permitted to overhaul the various piles of letters strewn over the dirty floor of the distributing-office. Both the Turkish and Persian mail is carried in saddle-bags on the backs of reinless horses driven at a rapid gallop before the mounted mail-carrier or herdsman. Owing to the carelessness of the postal officials, legations and consulates employ special couriers.

The proximity of Tabreez to the Russian border makes it politically, as well as commercially, one of the most important cities in Persia. For this reason it is the place of residence of the Emir-e-Nizam (leader of the army), or prime minister, as well as the Vali-Ahd, or Prince Imperial. This prince is the Russian candidate, as opposed to the English candidate, for the prospective vacancy on the throne. Both of these dignitaries invited us to visit them, and showed much interest in our “wonderful wind horses,” of the speed of which exaggerated reports had circulated through the country. We were also favored with a special letter for the journey to the capital.

On this stage we started August 15, stopping the first night at Turkmanchai, the little village where was signed the famous treaty of 1828 by virtue of which the Caspian Sea became a Russian lake. The next morning we were on the road soon after daybreak, and on approaching the next village overtook a curious cavalcade, just concluding a long night’s journey. This consisted of a Persian palanquin, with its long pole-shafts saddled upon the back of a mule at each end; with servants on foot, and a body-guard of mounted soldiers. The occupant of this peculiar conveyance remained concealed throughout the stampede which our sudden appearance occasioned among his hearse-bearing mules, for as such they will appear in the sequel. In our first article we mentioned an interview in London with Malcolm Khan, the representative of the Shah at the court of St. James. Since then, it seemed, he had fallen into disfavor. During the late visit of the Shah to England certain members of his retinue were so young, both in appearance and conduct, as to be a source of mortification to the Europeanized minister. This reached the ears of the Shah some time after his return home; and a summons was sent for the accused to repair to Teheran. Malcolm Khan, however, was too well versed in Oriental craft to fall into such a trap, and announced his purpose to devote his future leisure to airing his knowledge of Persian politics in the London press. The Persian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Musht-a-Shar-el-Dowlet, then residing at Tabreez, who was accused of carrying on a seditious correspondence with Malcolm Khan, was differently situated, unfortunately. It was during our sojourn in that city that his palatial household was raided by a party of soldiers, and he was carried to prison as a common felon. Being unable to pay the high price of pardon that was demanded, he was forced away, a few days before our departure, on that dreaded journey to the capital, which few, if any, ever complete. For on the way they are usually met by a messenger, who proffers them a cup of coffee, a sword, and a rope, from which they are to choose the method of their doom. This, then, was the occupant of the mysterious palanquin, which now was opened as we drew up before the village caravansary. Out stepped a man, tall and portly, with beard and hair of venerable gray. His keen eye, clear-cut features, and dignified bearing, bespoke for him respect even in his downfall, while his stooped shoulders and haggard countenance betrayed the weight of sorrow and sleepless nights with which he was going to his tomb.

At Miana, that town made infamous by its venomous insect, is located one of the storage-stations of the Indo-European Telegraph Company. Its straight lines of iron poles, which we followed very closely from Tabreez to Teheran, form only a link in that great wire and cable chain which connects Melbourne with London. We spent the following night in the German operator’s room.

The weakness of the Persian for mendacity is proverbial. One instance of this national weakness was attended with considerable inconvenience to us. By some mischance we had run by the village where we intended to stop for the night, which was situated some distance off the road. Meeting a Persian lad, we inquired the distance. He was ready at once with a cheerful falsehood. “One farsak” (four miles), he replied, although he must have known at the time that the village was already behind us. On we pedaled at an increased rate, in order to precede, if possible, the approaching darkness; for although traditionally the land of a double dawn, Persia has only one twilight, and that closely merged into sunset and darkness. One, two farsaks were placed behind us, and still there was no sign of a human habitation. At length darkness fell; we were obliged to dismount to feel our way. By the gradually rising ground, and the rocks, we knew we were off the road. Dropping our wheels, we groped round on hands and knees, to find, if possible, some trace of water. With a burning thirst, a chilling atmosphere, and swarms of mosquitos biting through our clothing, we could not sleep. A slight drizzle began to descend. During our gloomy vigil we were glad to hear the sounds of a caravan, toward which we groped our way, discerning, at length, a long line of camels marching to the music of their lantern-bearing leader. When our nickel-plated bars and white helmets flashed in the lantern-light, there was a shriek, and the lantern fell to the ground. The rear-guard rushed to the front with drawn weapons; but even they started back at the sound of our voices, as we attempted in broken Turkish to reassure them. Explanations were made, and the camels soon quieted. Thereupon we were surrounded with lanterns and firebrands, while the remainder of the caravan party was called to the front. Finally we moved on, walking side by side with the lantern-bearing leader, who ran ahead now and then to make sure of the road. The night was the blackest we had ever seen. Suddenly one of the camels disappeared in a ditch, and rolled over with a groan. Fortunately, no bones were broken, and the load was replaced. But we were off the road, and a search was begun with lights to find the beaten path. Footsore and hungry, with an almost intolerable thirst, we trudged along till morning, to the ding-dong, ding-dong of the deep-toned camel-bells. Finally we reached a sluggish river, but did not dare to satisfy our thirst, except by washing out our mouths, and by taking occasional swallows, with long intervals of rest, in one of which we fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. When we awoke the midday sun was shining, and a party of Persian travelers was bending over us.

From the high lands of Azerbeidjan, where, strange to say, nearly all Persian pestilences arise, we dropped suddenly into the Kasveen plain, a portion of that triangular, dried-up basin of the Persian Mediterranean, now for the most part a sandy, saline desert. The argillaceous dust accumulated on the Kasveen plain by the weathering of the surrounding uplands resembles in appearance the “yellow earth” of the Hoang Ho district in China, but remains sterile for the lack of water. Even the little moisture that obtains beneath the surface is sapped by the _kanots_, or underground canals, which bring to the fevered lips of the desert oases the fresh, cool springs of the Elburz. These are dug with unerring instinct, and preserved with jealous care by means of shafts or slanting wells dug at regular intervals across the plain. Into these we would occasionally descend to relieve our reflection-burned—or, as a Persian would say, “snow-burned”—faces, while the thermometer above stood at 120° in the shade.

Over the level ninety-mile stretch between Kasveen and the capital a so-called carriage-road has recently been constructed close to the base of the mountain. A sudden turn round a mountain-spur, and before us was presented to view Mount Demavend and Teheran. Soon the paved streets, sidewalks, lamp-posts, street-railways, and even steam-tramway, of the half modern capital were as much of a surprise to us as our “wind horses” were to the curious crowds that escorted us to the French Hotel.

From Persia it was our plan to enter Russian central Asia, and thence to proceed to China or Siberia. To enter the Transcaspian territory, the border-province of the Russian possessions, the sanction of its governor, General Kuropatkine, would be quite sufficient; but for the rest of the journey through Turkestan the Russian minister in Teheran said we would have to await a general permission from St. Petersburg. Six weeks were spent with our English and American acquaintances, and still no answer was received. Winter was coming on, and something had to be done at once. If we were to be debarred from a northern route, we would have to attempt a passage into India either through Afghanistan, which we were assured by all was quite impossible, or across the deserts of southern Persia and Baluchistan. For this latter we had already obtained a possible route from the noted traveler, Colonel Stewart, whom we met on his way back to his consular post at Tabreez. But just at this juncture the Russian minister advised another plan. In order to save time, he said, we might proceed to Meshed at once, and if our permission was not telegraphed to us at that point, we could then turn south to Baluchistan as a last resort. This, our friends unanimously declared, was a Muscovite trick to evade an absolute refusal. The Russians, they assured us, would never permit a foreign inspection of their doings on the Afghan border; and furthermore, we would never be able to cross the uninhabited deserts of Baluchistan. Against all protest, we waved “farewell” to the foreign and native throng which had assembled to see us off, and on October 5 wheeled out of the fortified square on the “Pilgrim Road to Meshed.”

Before us now lay six hundred miles of barren hills, swampy _kevirs_, brier-covered wastes, and salty deserts, with here and there some kanot-fed oases. To the south lay the lifeless desert of Luth, the “Persian Sahara,” the humidity of which is the lowest yet recorded on the face of the globe, and compared with which “the Gobi of China and the Kizil-Kum of central Asia are fertile regions.” It is our extended and rather unique experience on the former of these two that prompts us to refrain from further description of desert travel here, where the hardships were in a measure ameliorated by frequent stations, and by the use of cucumbers and pomegranates, both of which we carried with us on the long desert stretches. Melons, too, the finest we have ever seen in any land, frequently obviated the necessity of drinking the strongly brackish water.

Yet this experience was sufficient to impress us with the fact that the national poets, Hafiz and Sadi, like Thomas Moore, have sought in fancy what the land of Iran denied them. Those “spicy groves, echoing with the nightingale’s song,” those “rosy bowers and purling brooks,” on the whole exist, so far as our experience goes, only in the poet’s dream.

Leaving on the right the sand-swept ruins of Veramin, that capital of Persia before Teheran was even thought of, we traversed the pass of Sir-Dara, identified by some as the famous “Caspian Gate,” and early in the evening entered the village of Aradan. The usual crowd hemmed us in on all sides, yelling, “Min, min!” (“Ride, ride!”), which took the place of the Turkish refrain of “Bin, bin!” As we rode toward the caravansary they shouted, “Faster, faster!” and when we began to distance them, they caught at the rear wheels, and sent a shower of stones after us, denting our helmets, and bruising our coatless backs. This was too much; we dismounted and exhibited the ability to defend ourselves, whereupon they tumbled over one another in their haste to get away. But they were at our wheels again before we reached the caravansary. Here they surged through the narrow gangway, and knocked over the fruit-stands of the bazaars.

We were shown to a room, or windowless cell, in the honeycomb structure that surrounded an open quadrangular court, at the time filled with a caravan of pilgrims, carrying triangular white and black flags, with the Persian coat of arms, the same we have seen over many doorways in Persia as warnings of the danger of trespassing upon the religious services held within. The cadaverous stench revealed the presence of half-dried human bones being carried by relatives and friends for interment in the sacred “City of the Silent.” Thus dead bodies, in loosely nailed boxes, are always traveling from one end of Persia to the other. Among the pilgrims were blue and green turbaned Saids, direct descendants of the Prophet, as well as white-turbaned mollas. All were sitting about on the _sakoo_, or raised platform, just finishing the evening meal. But presently one of the mollas ascended the mound in the middle of the stable-yard, and in the manner of the muezzin called to prayer. All kneeled, and bowed their heads toward Mecca. Then the horses were saddled, the long, narrow boxes attached upright to the pack-mules, and the _kajacas_, or double boxes, adjusted on the backs of the horses of the ladies. Into these the veiled creatures entered, and drew the curtains, while the men leaped into the saddle at a signal, and, with the tri-cornered flag at their head, the cavalcade moved out on its long night pilgrimage. We now learned that the village contained a _chappar khan_, one of those places of rest which have recently been provided for the use of foreigners and others, who travel _chappar_, or by relays of post-horses. These structures are usually distinguished by a single room built on the roof, and projecting some distance over the eaves.

To this we repaired at once. Its keeper evinced unusual pride in the cleanliness of his apartments, for we were asked to take off our shoes before entering. But while our boastful host was kicking up the mats to convince us of the truth of his assertions, he suddenly retired behind the scenes to rid himself of some of the pests.

Throughout our Asiatic tour eggs were our chief means of subsistence, but _pillao_, or boiled rice flavored with grease, we found more particularly used in Persia, like _yaourt_ in Turkey. This was prepared with chicken whenever it was possible to purchase a fowl, and then we would usually make the discovery that a Persian fowl was either wingless, legless, or otherwise defective after being prepared by a Persian _fuzul_, or foreigner’s servant, who, it is said, “shrinks from no baseness in order to eat.” Though minus these particular appendages, it would invariably have a head; for the fanatical Shiah frequently snatched a chicken out of our hands to prevent us from wringing or chopping its head off. Even after our meal was served, we would keep a sharp lookout upon the unblushing pilferers around us, who had called to pay their respects, and to fill the room with clouds of smoke from their chibouks and gurgling kalians. For a fanatical Shiah will sometimes stick his dirty fingers into the dishes of an “unbeliever,” even though he may subsequently throw away the contaminated vessel. And this extreme fanaticism is to be found in a country noted for its extensive latitude in the profession of religious beliefs.