I did not get away in less than two hours. The Amir and Mirza, used to each other's modes of expression, found no difficulties, and Mirza being a man of education as well as intelligence, thought was conveyed as easily as fact. The lady kept her fine eyes lowered except when her husband spoke to her.
The chief topics were the education and position of women in England, religion, politics, and the future of Persia, and on all the Amir expressed himself with a breadth and boldness which were astonishing. How far the Amir has gone in the knowledge of the Christian faith I cannot say, nor do I feel at liberty to repeat his most interesting thoughts. A Sunni, a liberal, desiring complete religious liberty, absolutely tolerant to the Bābis, grateful for the kindness shown to some of them by the British Legation, and for the protection still given to them at the C.M.S. house, admiring Dr. Bruce's persevering work, and above all the Medical Mission, which he regards as "the crown of beneficence" and "the true imitation of the life of the Great Prophet, Jesus," all he said showed a strongly religious nature, and a philosophical mind much given to religious thought. "All true religions aim at one thing," he said, "to make the heart and life pure."
He asked a good deal about my travels, and special objects of interest in travelling, and was surprised when I told him that I nearly always travel alone; but after a moment's pause he said, "I do not understand that you were for a moment alone, for you had everywhere the love, companionship, and protection of God."
He regards as the needs of Persia education, religious liberty (the law which punishes a Moslem with death for embracing Christianity is still on the statute-book), roads, and railroads, and asked me if I had formed any opinion on the subject. I said that it appeared to me that security for the earnings of labour, and equal laws for rich and poor, administered by incorruptible judges, should accompany education. I much fear that he thinks incorruptible judges a vision of a dim future!
The subject of the position of women in England and the height to which female education is now carried interested him extremely. He wished his wife to understand everything I told him. The success of women in examinations in art, literature, music, and other things, and the political wisdom and absolutely constitutional rule of Queen Victoria, all interested him greatly. He asked if the women who took these positions were equally good as wives and mothers? I could only refer again to Queen Victoria. An Oriental cannot understand the position of unmarried women with us, or dissociate it from religious vows, and the Amir heard with surprise that a very large part of the philanthropic work which is done in England is done by women who either from accident or design have neither the happiness nor the duties of married life. He hopes to see women in Persia educated and emancipated from the trammels of certain customs, "but," he added, "all reform in this direction must come slowly, and grow naturally out of a wider education, if it is to be good and not hurtful."
He asked me what I should like to see in Isfahan, but when I mentioned the prison he said he should be ashamed to show it, and that except for political offences imprisonment is not much resorted to, that Persian justice is swift and severe—the bastinado, etc., not incarceration.
Afterwards I paid a similar visit to the house of Mirza Yusuf's other "benefactor," also a good and charitable man, who, as he speaks French well, acted as interpreter in the andarun.
A few days later the Amir-i-Panj, accompanied by General Faisarallah Khan, called on Dr. Bruce and on me, and showed how very agreeable a morning visit might be made, and the following day the Amir sent the same charger and escort for me, and meeting him and Dr. Bruce in the Chahar Bagh, we visited the Medresseh, a combined mosque and college, and the armoury, where we were joined by two generals and were afterwards entertained at tea in the Standard Room, while a military band played outside. The Amir had ordered some artificers skilled in the brass-work for which Isfahan is famous to exhibit their wares in one of the rooms at the armoury, and in every way tried to make the visit more agreeable than an inspection of the jail! He advises me not to wear a veil in the Bakhtiari country, and to be "as European as possible."
The armoury, of which he has had the organising, does not fall within my province. There are many large rooms with all the appliances of war in apparently perfect order for the equipment of 5000 men.
With equal brevity I pass over the Medresseh, whose silver gates and exquisite tiles have been constantly described. Decay will leave little of this beautiful building in a few years. The tiles of the dome, which can be seen for miles, are falling off, and even in the halls of instruction and in the grand mosque under the dome, which are completely lined and roofed by tiles, the making of some of which is a lost art, one may augur the approach of ruin from the loss or breakage here and there. In the rooms or cells occupied by the students, who study either theology or law, there are some very fine windows executed in the beautiful tracery common to Persia and Kashmir, but the effect of beauty passing into preventible decay is very mournful.