In the land of the lion and sun, or, modern Persia

by C. J. Wills

As I was looking out of window at the Kazerūn telegraph-office, I saw a man mounted on a handsome grey mare. I hallooed, and he stopped. I went down and parleyed. The mare was sound, and six years old, fast, light-mouthed. I felt that, if free from vice, she was what my wife wanted. I rode her, and succeeded in getting the man to close for seven hundred and fifty kerans, about thirty pounds. I gave him fifty kerans in cash, and a bill on Shiraz for the remainder. I never regretted the purchase. The mare was all that a lady’s horse should be. She was tall for Persia, being fourteen three in height, no goose rump, and very handsome. Her mouth soon got very light, and her only fault, a very trifling one, was that she carried her ears badly. My wife and I constantly rode her for four years, and after marching twenty-eight stages from Ispahan to the Caspian on her with a side-saddle on, I handed her over in good condition, having sold her for a fair price.

Of course the journey to my wife became now a pleasure. She had a horse of her own that did not jolt, and who at a word or a shake of the rein would canter or gallop, instead of the thwack, thwack of the muleteer’s yabū. By fancying the troubles of a lady compelled to cross the Rocky Mountains on a small Hampstead donkey, with a tendency to fall, one might form some faint ideas of my wife’s trials in getting over her five days’ climb from the coast to Kazerūn. We here left the date-groves, which had been numerous till now.

Two more passes remained to us—the Kotul Dokter and Kotul Peri Zun (the Passes of the Virgin and the Old Woman). That of the Old Woman is very bad indeed, and it is a wonder how loaded mules do get up it—miles of awful road among loose rocks and stones, and then steep zigzags of paved road up a perpendicular cliff. Awful work! We did it, however, and did it in the night; for we had been stopped by a great firing of guns and alarm of thieves in the beautiful Oak Valley, and so lost the daylight. We avoided a great part of the pass by scrambling up “Walker’s Road,” a straight path under the telegraph-line, well enough to walk down, but almost impossible to ride up, particularly at night; fortunately, we had a moon, and the weather was fine. My wife, however, was compelled to dismount twice, and we lugged, shoved, and dragged the horses up, the mules, of course, going by the high-road: at last we did get in, but all tired out.

Next day a longish march brought us to the hill leading down into the plain of Desht-i-arjeen. It was on this hill, some eleven years before, that Major St. John[33] was riding, when a lion suddenly sprang upon his horse’s hind-quarters. St. John had only a very small Colt’s revolver with him at the time, when suddenly he saw a lioness some thirty yards in front; he cracked his whip and shouted at her, thinking that she would bolt. She charged; sprang, and came down under his foot. With so small a pistol it would have been useless to fire, so he spurred his horse, which, however, would not move. The lioness now attacked from the rear, standing on her hind-legs, and clawing the horse’s hind-quarters; he then jumped off, getting, however, one slight scratch.

The horse now plunged and reared, knocking over the lioness on one side, and the man on the other. The horse now was moving away. The lioness stared at the horse, the man at her; then St. John fired a couple of shots over her head to frighten her, but without effect; she sprang again on the horse’s hind-quarters, and both were lost to view. After an hour St. John found his horse, who, however, would not let him mount. He drove the animal to the little hamlet, where he found a single family, but the fear of beasts would not let the head of it come out to search for the horse; however, next morning he was found quietly grazing; his quarters and flanks were scored in every direction with claw-marks, and one wound had penetrated the flesh, which St. John sewed up. In a week the horse was as well as ever, but bore the marks for the rest of his life.

I have taken the liberty of abridging Major St. John’s own account of this real lion story from his note to the article “Leo,” in the work on the ‘Zoology of Persia,’ volume ii., edited by Mr. W. Blandford, the well-known naturalist. At the time the affair took place, Major St. John was superintendent of the Persian Telegraph Department; shortly after, I had the honour of serving under him in Shiraz for some time, and was indebted to him for many kindnesses. I saw the horse some two years after the affair, and the scars were very apparent. I did not tell my wife this story till we had passed the stage, and there was no more lion country.

Our next march brought us to Khana Zinyun, where a handsome caravanserai has been built by the Muschir, the great man of Shiraz. Before reaching it we passed a pole, marking the place where the body of Sergeant Collins was found, after his murder by highway robbers in the famine time.

The next morning we rode into Shiraz, and had no sooner reached our house than the expected rain, which had happily held off during our journey, began to fall, the sky was overcast, and continuous storms took place, which lasted for a fortnight. Thanking our lucky stars, we prepared to make ourselves as comfortable as possible, and set to to unpack and arrange our quarters.

When we arrived at Shiraz, the superintendent’s house, which was in a garden just out of the town, was kindly placed at our disposal. In a few days I succeeded in hiring a good new brick-built house. We bought a few carpets, and moved into it.

My colleague, Dr. Odling, kindly gave us the loan of his furniture for the six months he expected to be away on leave, which was a good thing, as one cannot get furniture made in Shiraz, and everything has to be ordered in India or Ispahan. In the latter place there are fairly good carpenters.