1 39
2 sects in India, also on the day on which the Shias expose the
3 Tabut (coffin) in procession. In Cashmere, on these occasions,
4 the Mahoinedans burn each others'1 houses and shawl manufac-
5 tories. From Kermansha we went to Bagdad, with a caravan
6 carrying several embalmed dead bodies of Persians to Kerbela,
7 their sanctuary.
8 Persia is a high plain, diversified by ranges of hills and
9 deserts. It was in the month of August that we were on our
10 journey, and the air was so bitterly cold on the morning of our
11 setting out, that our very teeth chattered ; I recollected that at
12 home they call these the dog-days. We arrived at Bagdad,
13 where M. De Turk left me, as he was resolved to return to Paris
14 by land via Tocat and Constantinople, in order to take with him
15 some Arabian horses ; a speculation, by the way, which proved
16 by no means lucrative. A short time after his leaving me, I
17 received some good news from Lahore, through a Persian who
18 had been in the service of General Avitabile, which induced me
19 again to attempt going there at the commencement of the favour-
20 able season, i. e. the early part of the winter (1829). I felt the
21 more inclined to do so, as the plague was already raging at
22 Mosul, and the inhabitants of Bagdad were fearful that it might
23 extend as far as their own city, a thing which occurred soon
24 after. In the year 1828, there had been at Mosul and its
25 environs, a famine, in consequence of the crops failing, and
26 numerous families went down the Tigris to settle at Bagdad,
27 selling their children for a mere trifle, owing to the want of
28 means to support them. I myself saw a beautiful Christian girl
29 purchased for twenty grush (four shillings). Scarcely had I left
30 Bagdad when the plague broke out, and this scourge was
31 followed by an inundation. A war, previously noticed, also
32 broke out, during which Dohud Pasha was conducted as a
33 prisoner to Constantinople.
34 My only companion was a faithful servant, called Antun, a
35 Christian, whom I brought with me from Bagdad, and with
36 whom, after having passed through Bassora, and Moscat, I arrived
37 at Bcnder-Karatshi in Sind. From Karatshi, we pursued our