The whole region (between these mountains and those to the S. and W. indeed on every side) is undulatory, without a single clump of trees to enliven the sameness of the prospect; if therefore I had seen this part of the country in winter, I might perhaps have felt it still more inhospitable than any that we had crossed in the South. But now cultivation was seen in patches; here the corn was green, there lands were just under the ploughman’s hands.
As we were eating our breakfast we were overtaken by a man from Teheran, who was carrying to the Prince of Tabriz the intelligence that (after a siege of twelve successive years) the King’s troops had taken the strong place of Tourchiz, on the confines of Khorassan and Usbec Tartary, together with Mustapha Ali Khan Arab, the Governor, his troops, and the treasures that it contained. It is six days journey, as far as I could learn, South from Mesched, and is a fortress on the summit of a mountain, rendered strong by its natural situation. It gives its name to a very warlike tribe in Khorassan, of which the Governor, Mustapha Ali Khan Arab, was the chief. A great part of the treasures of Nadir Shah is said to have been preserved unbroken in Toorchiz, which would thus further swell the King’s collection of jewels and gold. I asked a Persian what the King would do with the Governor? he said, “Kill him to be sure;” and when I suggested, that it might be better to retain in his own service a man so bold and determined, he answered, “No: such sort of things may be very well with you; but the Persians are not so; the better you treat them, the worse they will treat you. The King, if he were not to kill him, would never be sure of him, for he would certainly rebel against him.”
On approaching Auk-kend, one of our attendants, who had dismounted for the purpose of letting his horse walk easily up the hill, by some chance suffered him to escape: all attempts to catch him were vain, until a chatter or walking footman, belonging to Mirza Abul Hassan, seized him by the bridle, when the horse retired some steps, and then open-mouthed made a bound at the chatter, caught him by the neck, and placing one of his fore-knees upon him, kept him thus with his head on the ground, until he was beat off. He was then seized by his master, to whom he meditated the same fate, and whom in fact he threw down most violently with his fore feet, though the final and furious gripe was prevented.
Auk-kend is now the frontier place in Aderbigian; the original boundary was the river Kizzil Ozan, but it has been thus extended through the King’s favour to his son Abbas Mirza, the Governor of the province. Auk-kend indeed is in the district of Khalcal, which, though certainly under the jurisdiction of the Prince, is immediately administered by two Khans, and contains two hundred villages, extending between Resht and Ardebil. Formerly it was a very flourishing region; but the war with Russia, in which it has been obliged to supply troops, and at its own expence pay, feed, and clothe them, has much impoverished it, and, as the Persians say, “Kharrab Shoud, it is ruined.”
18th. We proceeded from Auk-kend, at twenty minutes before five, and arrived at Miaunéh at one o’clock. We stopped on the road to feed our horses, which detained us one hour and an half, so that we had six hours and forty minutes riding, which, at three miles and a quarter in the hour, gives a total of twenty-two miles: I reckon thus little to the hour, because the whole of our march was over mountainous country. Our road was much to the Westward. The mountain Coflan Kou, which rose above us, bore S. 80 W. but, as we went somewhat more to the W. I shall place the general bearing at W.
The whole country here (and particularly that to the W. and N.) seems to have been just formed by a great convulsion of nature; there are lands of every soil, of every colour, and of every form. At the distance of six miles from Auk-kend we came to a small village called Kultepé; we should have stopped here to have fed our horses, but there was nothing but wheat-corn growing around the place; from this our suite always abstained most religiously, though they never scrupled to enter any barley field that might border on the road, and turning their cattle into the very middle without their bridles suffered them to eat their fill unlimited, nor was there any one that dared oppose such an inroad, which is indeed the privilege of every officer of government. I was quite vexed one day (when a poor man came and intreated the Persians to take their horses out of his field, for that its produce was his sole subsistence) to see the inhumanity with which they treated him; and, after having administered a few blows to his shoulders, compelled him to hold their horses as they were eating his own property before his face.
Bridge over the Kizzil Ozzan.
Drawn by James Morier Esqr.
Published by Messrs. Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme & Brown, Paternoster Row, May 1, 1811.
At about half past nine o’clock, and about fifteen miles from Auk-kend, we came to the banks of the Kizzil Ozan. The stream runs from West to East, in a bed of about two hundred yards in breadth, which was then in a great measure dry. It rises in the mountains of Gerustan, about five days journey from Miaunéh, and flows into the Caspian near Resht. We crossed it on a bridge, which appeared a very ancient structure, and is now falling fast to decay.