A RIDE TO TEHERAN IN 1888. 331 



and evil-doers of the capital fly for refuge from the 

 law, and most of the inhabitants, including the Shah, 

 make a weekly pilgrimage thither. The dome of this 

 mosque is covered with gold. A railway has been 

 built to this place from Teheran, five miles in length, 

 the money having been partly provided, I believe, by 

 a Belgian company. A week before I arrived in 

 Teheran a boy accidentally fell out of a carriage and 

 was run over, and the stupid and fanatical population 

 thinking the European engine-driver had done it on 

 purpose, set upon him with sticks and stones. He 

 defended himself and managed to reach the ticket 

 office of one of the stations, and threw all the money 

 he had in his pockets to the crowd, as a sop to 

 Cerberus. Finally he was obliged to draw his re- 

 volver, and killed two Persians with it. When I left, 

 he was lying under the care of some Eoman Catholic 

 sisters of mercy, in a precarious condition. The mob 

 subsequently wrecked and burnt the station and car- 

 riages, so I was unable to travel to the Mosque of Shah 

 Abdul Azim on the only line of railway in all Persia. 

 The Shah had sixty of them bastinadoed on the soles 

 of the feet. Not so very long ago, before the con- 

 struction of the railway, the Shah was driving out to 

 this place. A general prevented some soldiers hand- 

 ing to His Majesty a petition for their pay. Thus 

 thwarted of their rights they threw some stones 

 intended for this officer, who told His Majesty 

 that the missiles were aimed at him. Whereat all 

 soldiers within sight, and all found upon the road 



