by joining the Bactiarian mountaineers and becoming a leader of hordes. For good services rendered the Prince of Oologerte Berugia, Nicolas was named governor of Shuster; but political convulsions had unseated my friend, and he was obliged to seek the countenance of the sheikh of the Chabeans. This man, compassionating my situation, and delighting in serving a native of a country which held, as he expressed it, so many "dashing girls,"* advised me to seize the opportunity which the campaign against the Zobeirs offered for the useful exercise of my medical acquirements, and to place my services at the disposal of Sheikh Samur. The experiment appeared a bold one to a man utterly unacquainted with the mysteries of surgery, but it seemed to offer the only means of acquiring the sheikh's assistance in getting through the Chab territory into Persia. I accordingly waited on the sheikh; enumerated

Nicolas had lived during his stay in England in the Commercial Road, and was well acquainted with the purlieus of Whitechapel and Ratcliffe Highway, and their fair inhabitants.

my powers as a hakeem; exhibited my medicine chest, (which had been well filled at Bussorah,) and explained the virtues of calomel, laudanum, rhubarb, and other medicaments. The sheikh ordered me to be well entertained, gave me a tolerably decent asylum near his palace, and twice visited me.

It is needless to tire the reader with a detail of the vile experiments I made on the bodies of the wounded Chabeans; how many balls I extracted, how many wounds patched or plaistered, and how many stomachs I filled with nauseous nostrums. Suffice it to say, I endeavoured to avoid the destruction of human life, even if I did not succeed in affording its miseries relief. The sheikh was well pleased with my zeal, and more so with a box of ointment which I laid at his feet as a certain remedy for the impaired vision of his left eye. He had been stone blind from his childhood, but he held it disrespectful to be told so.

I passed seven days in quackery, and then waited on the sheikh at one of his afternoon

levies, and acquainted him with my wish to

A THIRD START.

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proceed to Bebuhan through the Chab territory. He promised me safe escort to Fellahi, the head quarters of the Chabeans; and a letter of introduction to his brother, Mobader Khan, the Prince of Chab. The following morning I prepared to depart; and, as soon as the ceremony of a mutton breakfast (for it was the feast of the Bairam) had been despatched, embarked in a small boat, with a guide, the promised letter, arms, a carpet, and a small bag of clothes.

Our course, for some hours, lay up the Karoon, until we reached the mouth of the Jerahi, the ancient Pasitigris, when we took an easterly direction, through a vast extent of morass inhabited by wild fowl, and swarming with musquitoes, whose incessant attack occasioned incredible torment. About midnight we picqueted the boat to some stout shrubbery on the left bank, and tried to repose. Early the next morning our course was renewed, and we reached the sheikh's palace at the eastern extremity of the town at about mid-day.

CHAPTER V.

The Chabean territory-The Sheikh of Fellahi-The Author's reception at the Chabean court-Sketch of the country, its resources, the people, &c.-Journey to Bebuhan.

FELLAHI, or, as Sir John Macdonald Kinneir calls it, Dorak,* is a town of very considerable extent, inasmuch as the houses are scattered over a large space of ground, and shadowed by luxurious groves of date and pomegranate trees.

It is rather singular that this intelligent officer, while admitting, in his able Geographical Memoir of Persia, that this place is more properly called Fellahi, should always designate it in his map and corresponding work by the term Dorak.

The form of the houses is different to any I had ever seen, in the villages on the banks of the Euphrates, or the shores of the Persian Gulph. They resemble English cottages, having a sloping roof of compact thatching, but in other respects they partake of the unsubstantial character of the Arab dwelling, the walls consisting merely of thick layers of long reeds, whose summits are interwoven with the thatching. The town occupies both banks of the Jerahé for some miles, and it is reputed to be generally healthy. There is within the town a citadel (the ancient limits of the town) protected by a high and thick wall, of about a mile and a half in circumference. Within this citadel, on the left bank of the river, is the Kooté, or palace of the sheikh, which may once have been a handsome and strong building, but is at present in a state of partial decay. There is a spacious meidan, or public square, in the centre of the palace, one side of which is occupied by the sheikh's park of artillery, consisting of about eight pieces of brass ordnance (long ninepounders) and two iron howitzers, all orna

VOL. I.

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