His intention, as above stated, was to proceed from Tebriz to Khorasan, to the governor of which place he had the strongest recommendations from the English ambassador, then resident at Tebriz with the Persian monarch. This of itself being a distance of nearly a thousand miles, through a barbarous country, was an adventure sufficiently arduous to have deterred any other individual, of a less persevering and determined character. From Khorasan he purposed nevertheless to make his way to Samarcand, and thence to Turkistan, an undertaking which even to the best informed among the natives, appeared to be full of difficulty, as well as danger.
Sir Gore Ouseley, with the greatest kindness and promptitude, undertook to procure him the protection of a Mahmendar, an officer of the King, under whose escort, as far as Chorasan, he not only would have had personal security, but horses and provisions every where at his command, at the expence of the Persian government.
There was, however, some little delay in the equipment of this officer appointed to attend him, occasioned partly by the tardiness of the man himself, and partly by the negociation then near a conclusion between the courts of Russia and Persia, which necessarily occupied a considerable portion of the ambassador’s time.
Browne accordingly became impatient, and left Tebriz with two attendants only, directing the Mahmendar to follow him. This officer having received his instructions, and apprehensive of the English Ambassador’s resentment, lost no time in his endeavour to overtake the traveller. Most unfortunately he found him within forty miles of the Persian Monarch’s camp, barbarously murdered. Plunder does not appear to have been the object, as Mr. Browne’s papers, pistols, and effects, were recovered, and placed in the hands of Sir Gore Ouseley. His money, of which he had not a great deal, was certainly seized by his servant. But in all probability, he owed his death not so much to any improper display of his property, as to his invincible obstinacy with which he resisted all expostulation and remonstrance, in always wearing the Turkish dress. Now it happens that the Hordes, by some of whom Browne was murdered, entertain the most deadly hatred and animosity against the Turks, for one of whom in all probability he was mistaken.
Strict search was, however, made after his assassins, and a great number of the inhabitants of the district, where he died, were apprehended, upon whom the King of Persia, without any judicial proceeding, expressed to the ambassador his determination of inflicting the summary punishment of death. This, however, Sir Gore O. would not permit.
The surmise that he owed his death to the circumstance of his appearing as a Turk, is somewhat confirmed by the fact, that within a few months preceding this melancholy event, Sir William Ouseley, brother to the ambassador, and who accompanied him in his mission, passed this very spot without molestation.
It is a subject of the deepest regret, and a most serious loss to literature, that Browne did not live to fulfil the object of his expedition. How well qualified he was to increase our stores of geographical information, his work on Africa sufficiently attested. Of the countries which he meditated to visit, with the view of describing, our information is very scanty as well as unsatisfactory. These were more particularly the regions of Chorasan, Boccara, Samarcand, &c. concerning which regions, our best books of geography communicate very little.
(Further particulars from another hand.)