Ali Mirza, the Prince of Shiraz, is not the least amiable of the King’s sons. After Prince Abbas Mirza, the Governor of Aderbigian, and the Heir of the crown, he is his father’s greatest favourite. In person he is an engaging youth of the most agreeable countenance and of very pleasing manners. His dress was most sumptuous; his breast was one thick coat of pearls, which was terminated downwards by a girdle of the richest stuffs. In this was placed a dagger, the head of which dazzled by the number and the brilliancy of its inlaid diamonds. His coat was rich crimson and gold brocade, with a thick fur on the upper part. Around his black cap was wound a Cashmire shawl, and by his side, in a gold platter, was a string of the finest pearls. Before him was placed his kaleoon of state, a magnificent toy, thickly inlaid with precious stones in every distinct part of its machinery. To me the Prince appeared to be under much constraint during the ceremony of our audience; in which he had been previously tutored by his minister: and I very easily believe, according to the stories related of him, that he exchanges with eagerness these etiquettes of rank for the less restrained enjoyments of his power. On these he lavishes his revenue; and in the costliness of a hunting equipage, the fantasies of dress, and the delicacies of the Harem are frittered away a hundred thousand tomauns a year. Young as he is, (for he is only nineteen) he has already a family of eight children. In his public government he is much beloved by his people; and although the Persians are not inclined in conversation to spare the faults of their superiors, of him I never heard an evil word. He has not indeed those sanguinary propensities, which are almost naturally imbibed in the possession of despotic power; and where others cut off ears, slit noses, and pierce eyes, he contents himself with the administration of the more lenient bastinado.
Nasr Oallah Khan is appointed by the King to remit to the court of Teheran any surplus revenue; an office probably neither easy to the Minister, nor acceptable to the Prince, whose immense and splendid establishments exact a very liberal proportion of the whole receipts of the province. In his actual service and pay the Prince has only a force of one thousand cavalry, of which two hundred (the quota furnished by the Baktiar tribe) form his body guard; but in an emergency he could sent to the war twenty thousand horsemen. His troops provide their own arms and clothing, and they receive annually in pay forty piastres, and a daily allowance of one maun (seven pounds and a quarter) of barley, two mauns of straw, and a quarter of a maun of wheat, except in spring when their horses feed on the new herbage. They have further, each in his own country, for the maintenance of their families, a certain allotment of land, which they till and sow, and of which they reap the annual fruits. When a new levy is ordered, the head of each tribe brings forward the number which the state has required of him.
4th. At about one hour before sun-set, we repaired to the house of the Minister, to partake of an entertainment which was given to the Envoy. We had scarcely dismounted from our horses at the Minister’s gate, when the crowd, anxious to obtain admission, rushed forward, and long impeded the passage of the suite; until our Mehmandar himself commanded respect by administering a volley of blows with a stick on the heads of the surrounding multitude. As soon as the Envoy entered the court, (which appeared from the numbers already pressed into it, to be the scene of the amusement), the Persian music struck up, and a rope dancer, whose rope stood conspicuous in the centre, begun to vault into the air.
Abdullah Khan, the Minister’s Son, conducted us into the presence of his father, where we soon ranged ourselves among a numerous company of the Nobles of the place, who were invited to meet us. Abdullah Khan, who is a man of about thirty, and a person of much consequence at Shiraz, never once seated himself in the apartment where his father sat, but, according to the Eastern customs of filial reverence, stood at the door like a menial servant, or went about superintending the entertainments of the day. As soon as we were settled, the amusements commenced; and at the same moment the rope-dancer vaulted, the dancing boys danced, the water-spouter spouted, the fire-eater devoured fire, the singers sung, the musicians played on their kamounchas, and the drummers beat lustily on their drums. This singular combination of noises, objects and attitudes, added to the cries and murmurs of the crowd around, amused, yet almost distracted us.
The rope-dancer performed some feats, which really did credit to his profession. He first walked over his rope with his balancing pole, then vaulted on high; he ascended the rope to a tree in an angle of forty-five degrees? but, as he was reaching the very extremity of the upper range of the angle, he could proceed no further, and remained in an uncertain position for the space of two minutes. He afterwards tied his hands to a rope-ladder of three large steps; and, first balancing his body by the middle on the main line let fall the ladder and himself, and was only brought up by the strength of his wrists thus fastened to their support. He next put on a pair of high-heeled shoes, and paraded about again; then put his feet into two saucepans, and walked backwards and forwards. After this he suspended himself by his feet from the rope; and, taking a gun, deliberately loaded and primed it, and, in that pendant position, took an aim at an egg (placed on the ground beneath him) and put his ball through it. After this he carried on his back a child, whom he contrived to suspend, with his own body besides, from the rope, and thence placed in safety on the ground. His feats were numerous (and as he was mounted on a rope much more elevated than those on which such exploits are displayed in England), they were also proportionably dangerous. A trip would have been his inevitable destruction. He was dressed in a fantastical jacket, and wore a pair of breeches of crimson satin, something like those of Europeans. The boys danced, or rather paced the ground, snapping their fingers to keep time with the music, jingling their small brass castanets, and uttering extraordinary cries. To us all this was tiresome, but to the Persians it appeared very clever. One of the boys having exerted himself in various difficult leaps, at last took two kunjurs or daggers, one in each hand; and with these, springing forwards, and placing their points in the ground, turned himself head over heels between them; and again, in a second display, turned himself over with a drawn sword in his mouth.
A negro appeared on the side of a basin of water (in which three fountains were already playing), and, by a singular faculty which he possessed of secreting liquids, managed to make himself a sort of fourth fountain, by spouting water from his mouth. We closely observed him: he drank two basins and a quarter of water, each holding about four quarts, and he was five minutes spouting them out. Next came an eater of fire: this man brought a large dish full of charcoal, which he placed deliberately before him, and then, taking up the pieces, conveyed them bit by bit successively into his mouth, and threw them out again when the fire was extinguished. He then took a piece, from which he continued to blow the most brilliant sparks for more than half an hour. The trick consists in putting in the mouth some cotton dipped in the oil of Naptha, on which the pieces of charcoal are laid and from which they derive the strength of their fire: now the flame of this combustible is known to be little calid. Another man put into his mouth two balls alternately, which burnt with a brilliant flame, and which also were soaked in the same fluid.
The music was of the roughest kind. The performers were seated in a row round the basin of water; the band consisted of two men, who played the kamouncha, a species of violin; four, who beat the tamborin; one, who thrummed the guitar; one, who played on the spoons; and two who sung. The loudest in the concert were the songsters, who, when they applied the whole force of their lungs, drowned every other instrument. The man with the spoons seemed to me the most ingenious and least discordant of the whole band. He placed two wooden spoons in a neat and peculiar manner betwixt the fingers of his left hand, whilst he beat them with another spoon in his right.
All this continued till the twilight had fairly expired; when there commenced a display of fire-works on a larger scale than any that I recollect to have seen in Europe. In the first place, the director of the works caused to be thrown into the fountain before us a variety of fires, which were fixed on square flat boards, and which bursting into the most splendid streams and stars of flame, seemed to put the water in one entire blaze. He then threw up some beautiful blue lights, and finished the whole by discharging immense vollies of rockets which had been fixed in stands, each of twenty rockets, in different parts of the garden and particularly on the summits of the walls. Each stand exploded at once; and at one time the greater part of all the rockets were in the air at the same moment, and produced an effect grand beyond the powers of description.
At the end of this exhibition, a band of choice musicians and songsters was introduced into the particular apartment where we were seated. A player on the kamouncha really drew forth notes, which might have done credit to the better instruments of the West: and the elastic manner with which he passed his bow across the strings, convinced me that he himself would have been an accomplished performer even among those of Europe, if his ear had been tutored to the harmonies and delicacies of our science. The notes of their guitar corresponded exactly to those of our instrument. Another sung some of the odes of Hafiz, accompanied by the kamouncha, and in a chorus by the tamborins.
After this concert, some parts of which were extremely noisy and some not unpleasant even to our ears, appeared from behind a curtain a dirty-looking negro, dressed as a fakeer or beggar, with an artificial hump, and with his face painted white. This character related facetious stories, threw himself into droll attitudes, and sung humorous songs. Amongst other things he was a mimic; and, when he undertook to ridicule the inhabitants of Ispahan he put our Shiraz audience into ecstacies of delight and laughter. He imitated the drawling manner of speaking, and the sort of nonchalance so characteristic of the Ispahaunees. The people of Shiraz, (who regard themselves as the prime of Persians, and their language as the most pure, and their pronunciation as the most correct), are never so well amused as when the people and the dialect of Ispahan are ridiculed. Those of Ispahan, on the other hand, boast, and with much reason, of their superior cleverness and learning, though with these advantages indeed they are said to mix roguery and low cunning. The exhibition finished by the singing of a boy, the most renowned of the vocal performers at Shiraz, and one of the Prince’s own band. His powers were great, descending from the very highest to the very lowest notes; and the tremulations of his voice, in which the great acme of his art appeared to consist, were continued so long and so violently, that his face was convulsed with pain and exertion. In order to aid the modulations, he kept a piece of paper in his hand, with which he did not cease to fan his mouth. When the concert was over, we collected our legs under us (which till this time we had kept extended at ease) to make room for the sofras or table-cloths, which were now spread before us. On these were first placed trays of sweet viands, light sugared cakes, and sherbet of various descriptions. After these, dishes of plain rice were put, each before two guests; then pillaus, and after them a succession and variety, which would have sufficed ten companies of our number. On a very moderate calculation there were two hundred dishes, exclusive of the sherbets. All these were served up in bowls and dishes of fine china; and in the bowls of sherbet were placed the long spoons made of pear-tree, (which I mentioned on a former occasion), and each of which contained about the measure of six common table-spoons, and with these every guest helped himself. The Persians bent themselves down to the dishes, and ate in general most heartily and indiscriminately of every thing sweet and sour, meat and fish, fruit and vegetable. They are very fond of ice, which they eat constantly, and in great quantities, a taste which becomes almost necessary to qualify the sweetmeats which they devour so profusely. The Minister Nasr Oallah Khan had a bowl of common ice constantly before him, which he kept eating when the other dishes were carried away. They are equally fond of spices, and of every other stimulant; and highly recommended one of their sherbets, a composition of sugar, cinnamon, and other strong ingredients. As the Envoy sat next to the Minister, and I next to the Envoy, we very frequently shared the marks of his peculiar attention and politeness, which consisted in large handfuls of certain favourite dishes. These he tore off by main strength, and put before us; sometimes a full grasp of lamb mixed with a sauce of prunes, pistachio-nuts, and raisins; at another time, a whole partridge disguised by a rich brown sauce; and then, with the same hand, he scooped out a bit of melon, which he gave into our palms, or a great piece of omelette thickly swimming in fat ingredients. The dishes lie promiscuously before the guests, who all eat without any particular notice of one another. The silence, indeed, with which the whole is transacted is one of the most agreeable circumstances of a Persian feast. There is no rattle of plates and knives and forks, no confusion of lacquies, no drinking of healths, no disturbance of carving, scarcely a word is spoken, and all are intent on the business before them. Their feasts are soon over; and, although it appears difficult to collect such an immense number of dishes, and to take them away again without much confusion and much time, yet all is so well regulated that every thing disappears as if by magic. The lacquies bring the dishes in long trays called conchas, which are discharged in order, and which are again taken up and carried away with equal facility. When the whole is cleared, and the cloths rolled up, ewers and basins are brought in, and every one washes his hand and mouth. Until the water is presented it is ridiculous enough to see the right hand of every person (which is covered with the complicated fragments of all the dishes) placed in a certain position over his left arm: there is a fashion even in this. The whole entertainment was now over, and we took our leaves and returned home. Such a fête costs a very considerable sum. Besides ourselves, all the Envoy’s numerous servants, and all the privates of his body guard were invited to it, and eat and drank in different apartments. The same dinner which had been put before us was afterwards carried to them, and I understand that, even in the common domestic life of a Persian, the profusion which is exhibited on his table surprises the European stranger; and is explained only by the necessity of feeding his numerous household, to whom all his dishes are passed, after he has satisfied his own appetite.