HESSO KHAN.
Hesso's house is just a "but and a ben," with a door which involves stooping. Its rough stone walls are unplastered, and the only light admitted comes from a hole in the roof, which serves to let out the smoke. I confess to a feeling of trepidation when I asked to see the Kurdish chief, and I felt the folly of my errand. A superbly-dressed Kurd took us into a room dense with tobacco smoke, which, from its darkness, the roughness of its walls, and the lowness of its rude roof, resembled a cave rather than a house. Yet Hesso receives £200 a year from the Persian Government, and has apparently unlimited opportunities for plunder.
There were some coarse mats on the floor, and a samovar with some Russian glass tea-cups. Two Persian officials and a number of well-armed and splendidly-dressed Kurds, with jewelled khanjars and revolvers in their girdles and rifles by their sides, sat or reclined against the wall. Hesso himself leaned against a roll of bedding at the upper end of the room, and space was made for us on the floor at his left hand. A superb stage brigand he looked, in fitting surroundings, the handsomest man I have seen in Persia, a large man, with a large face, dark prominent eyes, a broad brow, a straight nose, superb teeth, a fine but sensual mouth, a dark olive complexion, and a false smile. A jewelled Kurdish turban with much crimson, a short jacket and full trousers of a fine cream-coloured woollen fabric, an embroidered silk shirt, socks of an elaborate pattern, a girdle of many yards of Kashmir stuff, with eight knots, one above another, in the middle, and a khelat or coat of honour of rich Kerman brocade formed his striking costume. In his girdle he wore a khanjar, with an ebony hilt and scabbard ornamented with filigree gold knobs incrusted with turquoises, attached to the girdle by a silver chain two yards long, of heavy filigree balls, a beautiful piece of work. Hesso's brothers, superb men, most picturesquely dressed, surrounded him. The Kurds who handed round the tea and the jewelled kalians looked fantastic brigands. The scene was a picture.
Of course my errand failed. I could not speak about the sheep through the priest of the robbed village, and Hesso said that he could not speak on any "political" subject before the Persians who were present. The conversation was not animated, and Qasha Bardah was very nervous till Hesso turned round, and with an awakened expression of face asked how it was that "England had allowed Turkey to grow so feeble that her frontier and Armenia are in a state of anarchy"? Hesso's handsome face is that of a villain. He does not look more than thirty. He has 200 well-mounted marksmen at his disposal. The father of this redoubtable Kurdish chief died in prison, where he was confined by order of the Shah, and the son revenged himself by harrying this part of the Shah's dominions, and with sixty men, including his six brothers, successfully resisted a large Persian force sent against him, and eventually escaped into Turkey, doing much damage on his way. Hesso on arriving in Kerbela obtained a letter from the Sheikh, or chief Mollah there, saying that he offered his submission to the Shah, and went to Tihran, where after seeing the Shah's splendour he said that if he had known it before, he would not have been in rebellion.
Before this the Persians took a strong castle from the Kurds, and garrisoned it with an officer and a company of soldiers. Up to it one day went Hesso boldly, keeping the six men who went with him out of sight, and thumped upon the gate till it was opened, saying he was a bearer of despatches. He first shot the sentry dead, and next the officer, who came to see what the disturbance was about. Meantime the six men, by climbing on each other's shoulders, scaled the castle wall, and by confused shouts and dragging of the stone roller to and fro over the roof they made the garrison believe that it was attacked by a large force, and it surrendered at discretion. The lives of the soldiers were spared, but they were marched out in their shirts, with their hands above their heads.
The Merwana threshing-floor was guarded at night by ten men. The following morning we were to have started an hour before daylight, but the katirgis refused to load, and the Kurdish ketchuda, with his horsemen, declined to start till an hour after sunrise, because he could not earlier "tell friends from foes." The ground was covered with hoar-frost, and the feathery foliage of the tamarisk was like the finest white coral.
Turning into the mountains, we spent nine hours in a grand defile, much wooded, where a difficult path is shut in with the Marbishu torrent. The Kurds left us at Bani, when two fine fellows became our protectors as far as a small stream, crossing which we entered Turkey. At a Kurdish semi-subterranean village, over which one might ride without knowing it, a splendidly-dressed young Khan emerged from one of the burrows, and said he would give us guards, but they would not go farther than a certain village, where two of his men had been killed three days before. "There is blood between us and them," he said. After that, for five hours up to Marbishu, the scenery is glorious. The valley narrows into a picturesque gorge between precipitous mountains, from 2000 to 4000 feet above the river, on the sides of which a narrow and occasionally scaffolded path is carried, not always passable for laden mules. Many grand ravines came down upon this gorge, their dwarf trees, orange, tawny, and canary-yellow, mingled with rose-red leafage. The rose bushes are covered with masses of large carnation-red hips, the bramble trailers are crimson and gold, the tamarisk is lemon-yellow. Nature, like the dolphin, is most beautiful in dying.
The depths were filled with a blue gloom, the needle-like peaks which tower above glittered with new-fallen snow, the air was fresh and intoxicating—it was the romance of travel. But it soon became apparent that we were among stern and even perilous realities. A notorious robber chief was disposed to bar our passage. His men had just robbed a party of travellers, and were spread over the hill. They took a horse from Johannes, but afterwards restored it on certain conditions. Farther on we met a number of Kurds, with thirty fat sheep and some cattle, which they were driving off from Marbishu. Then the katirgis said that they would go no farther than the village, for they heard that robbers were lying in wait for us farther on!
In the wildest part of the gorge, where two ravines meet, there is fine stoneless soil, tilled like a garden; the mountains fall a little apart—there are walnuts, fruit trees, and poplars; again the valley narrows, the path just hangs on the hillside, and I was riding over the roofs of village houses for some time before I knew it. The hills again opened, and there were flourishing breadths of turnips, and people digging potatoes, an article of food and export which was introduced by the missionaries forty years ago. The glen narrowed again, and we came upon the principal part of Marbishu—rude stone houses in tiers, burrowing deeply into the hills, with rock above and rock below on the precipitous sides of a noisy torrent, crossed by two picturesque log bridges, one of the wildest situations I have ever seen, and with a wintry chill about it, for the sun at this season deserts it at three. Rude, primitive, colourless, its dwellings like the poorest cowsheds, its church like a Canadian ice-house, clinging to mountain sides and spires of rock, so long as I remember anything I shall remember Marbishu.
Steep narrow paths and steep rude steps brought us to a three-sided yard, with a rough verandah where cooking and other operations were going on, and at the entrance we were cordially welcomed by Qasha Ishai, the priest. After ascertaining that it would be very dangerous to go farther, I crossed the river to the church, which is one of the finest in the country, and a place of pilgrimage. The village is noted for its religious faithfulness. The church is said to be 850 years old—a low, flat-roofed, windowless stone building. Either it was always partially subterranean, or the earth has accumulated round it, for the floor is three feet below the ground outside. The entrance is by a heavy door two feet six inches high. Inside it is as nearly dark as possible. Two or three circular holes at a great height in the enormously thick wall let in as many glimmers, but artificial light is necessary. There are several small ante-chapels. In two are rude and ancient tombs of ancient bishops, plain blocks of stone, with crosses upon them. In another is a rough desk, covered with candle droppings, on which the Liturgy of the Apostles lay open, and on it a cross, which it is the custom to kiss. A fourth is used for the safe keeping of agricultural implements. Two are empty, and one of these serves the useful purpose of a mortuary chapel. The church proper is very small and high. The stone floor has been worn into cavities by the feet of worshippers; the walls, where not covered with lengths of grimy printed cotton, are black with the candle smoke of ages. The one sign of sacred use is a rude stone screen at the east end, at openings in the front of which the people receive the Eucharist. Behind this is the sanctuary, into which the priest alone, and he fasting, may enter. Old brass lamps and candelabra, incrusted with blackened tallow, hang from the roof, and strings of little bells from wall to wall, which are plucked by each recipient of the sacred elements as he returns to his "stand."