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The Persians do not apparently think much of their own system of education, for they are always laughing at their schoolmasters.
They have a story of a chārvādār, or muleteer, one of whose mules strayed one day into a school. It was quickly driven out, and the muleteer claimed damages from the schoolmaster to the extent of half the value of the mule. The schoolmaster indignantly asked on what he based his claim. The muleteer turned to the crowd which had gathered to listen to the argument. “My beast,” said he, “went into his school a mule and it has come out a donkey.” You see a donkey counts half a mule in caravan travelling, just as a child counts half a person in train travelling.
The punishments are as topsy-turvy as the lessons. When a boy is caned he lies on his back and holds out his feet instead of his hands. Sometimes his feet are held in a kind of stocks while he is caned across the soles. They call it “eating sticks” or “eating wood”—the words are the same.