The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan | Page 6

the chief executioner gives an admirable account, as true now as when penned, of the methods by which salaries are capable of being recruited in Persia; and the speech of the grand vizier in chapter lxxviii., on political morality as interpreted in that country, would, I am confident, have been enthusiastically re-echoed by every subsequent incumbent of that high office.
The art, however, in which Morier especially excels is of introducing, so to speak by a side wind, as a subordinate incident in the narrative, or as a spontaneous comment on the lips of the various dramatis personae, informing and luminous knowledge upon the local charactistics of places, or the social customs of peoples. For instance, he takes advantage of being at Meshed to bring in the passion-play of Hussein, as annually enacted by the Shiah Mohammedans in the month of Moharrem; of mentioning Herat to introduce the bad-i-sad-o-bist-ruz or famous ‘wind of 120 days’; of conducting his hero to Kum, to describe the curious prescription of bast or sanctuary that still adheres to that sacred spot; and of his arrival at Bagdad, to inflict upon him the familiar pest of the Bagdad pimple. His description of camp-life among the Turcomans is only surpassed in fidelity by his corresponding picture of the vagrant existence of the border C?rds; nor is there anywhere to be found a more dramatic realisation of the incidents of a nomad encampment, the arrangement and meals and etiquette, the striking of the tents, and the straggling march of the tribes with their flocks and herds, than in the narrative of the child-hood of the C?rdish slave Zeenab.
It is to be noted that Morier represents her as a Yezeedi or devil-worshipper (though it is more than doubtful whether the Yezeedis could ever with justice be so described), and attributes her origin to one of the incestuous nocturnal orgies that were said to be practised by that people, and that gave rise to the epithet Chiragh Sunderun, or Lamp Extinguishers. It is to be observed, however, that in such a case Zeenab would have known her parentage on the maternal rather than on the paternal side; whereas Morier, by a curious error, represents her as knowing her father, but being in ignorance of the identity of her mother.
In different chapters of “Hajji Baba” we are further initiated into the domestic life and habits of the Persians. We learn that it is considered a mark of respect for a man to keep his hands and feet hidden beneath the folds of his dress. In two places we have mention of the profoundly Persian device of conforming with the letter, while trifling with the spirit of the religious law, by neatly ripping open a seam as a substitute for rending the fabric of a garment in token of woe. We are reminded of the prohibition from exacting interest that is imposed upon the true believer, and of the still common custom of divination by extracting a fall from the pages of Hafiz or Saadi. We may gain a good deal of information about the culinary methods of Turcomans, Persians, and C?rds; the operations of the hammam or bath are disclosed to us, and we are surreptitously introduced along with the hero to the mysteries the Persian harem or ander?n, and its petty existence, inane frivolity, open jealousy, and clandestine intrigue. The death and funeral of the old barber provide an opportunity for a valuable account of Persian customs upon those occasions.
Similarly the story of Y?s?f and Mariam is utilised to furnish an equally interesting description of the Armenian ritual in cases of betrothal and marriage. Incidentally the return of the poet Asker from his captivity among the Turcomans acquaints us with the curious habit of bringing back a person supposed to be dead, not by the door, but through the roof; and when Hajji Baba, from the terrace of the doctor’s house, listens to ‘the distant din of the king’s band, the crash of the drums, and the swell of the trumpets, announcing sunset,’ he is alluding to a custom that has prevailed for centuries in all the Mohammedan courts of Central Asia and India, that is supposed to be a relic of extinct sun-worship, and that is still observed in seats of royal or princely rule, alike at Tehran, Ispahan and Kabul.
Mention should not be omitted, in passing, of the perfect familiarity of the author both with cultured and colloquial Persian and with the Persian classics. An Oriental metaphor, however hyperbolical, slips as easily from his lips as though it had always rested there. Quotations from Hafiz and Saadi play as large and as apposite a part in his dialogue as they do to this day in the conversation of any well-educated Asiatic who has been brought up in countries