LETTER xxn A JOLLY CHARVADAE 145

crest and boiled up out of his corries, and for the first
time since the middle of January there were six hours
of heavy rain, with hail and thunder, and a fall of the
mercury within one hour from 78° to 59°. The coolness
was most delicious.

Hadji Hussein's prophecy that after I left him I should
"know what charvadars are" was not fulfilled on this
journey. I had one young man with me who from having
performed the pilgrimage to Kerbela bears the name of
" Kerbelai" for the rest of his life. He owns the fine and
frisky animals he drives, and goes along at a good pace,
his long gun over his shoulder, singing as he goes.
Blithe, active, jolly, obliging, honest, kind-hearted, he
loads as fast as three ordinary men, and besides grooming
and feeding his animals well, he " ran messages," got the
water and wood, and helped to pitch and strike the
tents, and was as ready to halt as to march. Hassan and
Mirza are most deliberate in their movements; nothing
can hurry them, not even the risk of being flooded out
of their tents; and when the storm came on Kerbelai
snatched the spade from them and in no time trenched
my tent and dug a channel to let the water out of the
meadow.

The next day was cloudless, and the sky, instead of
having a whitish or steely blue, had the deep pure tint
so often seen on a June day in England. The heat
returned, and it was a fatiguing and dusty march into
Hamadan, still mainly on the skirts of Elwend, among
villages surrounded by vineyards. After pursuing a by-
road from Jamilabad I joined the main road, two miles
from Hamadan, and the number of men on good horses,
of foot passengers, and of asses laden with fruit and
vegetables, indicated the approach to a capital as plainly
as the wide road, trenched on both sides and planted
with young willows.

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