Tired Out With The Stiff
Climb, I Fell Into A Delicious Slumber, Notwithstanding The Noise,
About Nine O'clock, To Be Awakened Shortly After By A Soft, Cold
Substance Falling Heavily, With A Splash, Upon My Face.
Striking a
match, I discovered a large bat which the smoke from our fire (there
was no chimney) had evidently detached from the rafters.
I purchased, the next morning before starting, a Persian dagger
belonging to one of the caravan-men. He was one of the Bakhtiari,
a wild and lawless tribe inhabiting a tract of country (as yet
unexplored by Europeans) on the borders of Persia and Asia Minor. The
blade of the dagger is purest Damascene work, the handle of fossilized
ivory. On the back of the blade is engraved, in letters of inlaid
gold, in Arabic characters -
"There is one God! He is Eternal!"
"Victory is nigh, O true believer!"
Connoisseurs say that the dagger is over a hundred years old. After
quite an hour's haggling (during which our departure was delayed, much
to Gerome's disgust), I managed to secure it for L9 English money,
although the Bakhtiari assured me that he had already sworn "by his
two wives" never to part with it. I have since been offered four times
the amount by a good judge of Eastern weapons.
A second pass, the Kotal Doktar, lay between us and Bushire. Though
steep and slippery in places, the path is well protected, and there
are no boulders to bar the way. On leaving the caravanserai, we paused
to examine the second longest telegraph wire (without support) in the
world. It is laid from summit to summit of two hills, and spans a
valley over a mile in width. [C]
The country round Meyun Kotal is well cultivated, and we passed not
only men, but women, ploughing with the odd-shaped primitive wooden
ploughs peculiar to these parts. Near the foot of the pass some
children were gathering and collecting acorns, which are here eaten in
the form of a kind of bread by the peasantry. Seldom has Nature seemed
more beautiful than on that bright cloudless morning, as we rode
through sweet-scented uplands of beans and clover, meadows of deep
rich grass. By the track bloomed wild flowers, violets and narcissus,
shedding their fresh delicate perfume. The song of birds and hum of
insects filled the air, bright butterflies flashed across our path,
while the soft distant notes of a cuckoo recalled shady country lanes
and the sunlit hay-fields of an English summer. It was like coming
from the grave, after the sterile deserts and bleak desolate plains of
Northern Persia.
There is a small square building at the northern end of the Kotal
Doktar, a mud hut, in which are stationed a guard of soldiers to be
of assistance in the event of robbery of caravans or travellers. Such
cases are not infrequent. Upon our approach, three men armed with
flint-locks and long iron pikes accosted us.
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