[170] Carpini says that there was a certain cemetery for the emperors and chiefs, to which their bodies were carried whenever they died, and that much treasure was buried with them. No one was allowed to come near this cemetery except the keepers (Recueil de Voyages, iv. 631). Marco Polo says that if the chief lord died a hundred days journey from this cemetery, which was in the Altai mountains, his body must be carried thither. Also “when the bodies of the Khans are carried to these mountains, the conductors put to the sword all the men whom they meet on the road, saying, ‘Go and serve the great lord in the other world;’ and they do the same to the horses, killing also for that purpose the best he has” (ii. 45).
[171] This seems from Alcock to be the Japanese practice. Le Roi est mort, vive le Roi!
[172] Doubtless our friar had in his mind the words of Isaiah, “Wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures: and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there. And the wild beasts of the island shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces” (xiii. 21-22).
[173] Probably a kirbah, or water skin, or perhaps several tied together, frequently used by the fellahs to cross the Tigris and Euphrates. There are no large tortoises in either of those rivers. (B.)
[174] A couple of buffalos, perhaps, which may frequently be seen swimming across the stream with only their muzzles and horns above water. (B.)
[175] Referring probably to Harrán, the Haran of Scripture. The country generally being desert, there was little to say about it. (B).
This chapter is a worthy parallel to that one in Horrebow’s History of Iceland, “Concerning Owls and Snakes,” which Sir Walter Scott quotes more than once with such zest.
[176] See ch. ii. parag. 7, ante.
[177] One of the best accounts of Baku is in the Travels of George Forster, of the Bengal Civil Service, who came overland from India by the Caspian in 1784. There were at that time a considerable number of Multán Hindus at Baku, where they had long been established, and were the chief merchants of Shirwán. The Átish-gáh, or Place of Fire, was a square of about thirty yards, surrounded by a low wall, and containing many apartments, in each of which was a small jet of sulphureous fire issuing through a furnace or funnel, “constructed in the form of a Hindu altar.” The fire was used for worship, cookery, and warmth. On closing the funnel the fire was extinguished, when a hollow sound was heard, accompanied by a strong and cold current of air. Exclusive of these there was a large jet from a natural cleft, and many small jets outside the wall, one of which was used by the Hindus for burning the dead.
The whole country round Baku has at times, according to Kinneir, the appearance of being enveloped in flame, and during moonlight nights in November and December a bright blue light is observed to cover the whole western range. My friend Colonel Patrick Stewart, who was lately for some days at Baku, tells me that it is often possible to “set the sea on fire”, i.e., the gaseous exhalations on the surface. He says the Hindus are now only two or three, one of whom, a very old man, had lost the power of speaking his native tongue.