2 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



the invading infidels would most undoubtedly adorn 

 the gate of his majesty's palace, for the present their 

 big long-range guns had utterly destroyed the cour- 

 age of the troops of the "king of kings." A 68- 

 pound shot, which had gone lobbing by the Kajar's 

 Cashmere-shawl tent, had on one occasion been picked 

 up, placed on a camel's back, and at once started off 

 to the capital, and eventually submitted to the in- 

 spection of the august eyes of the sovereign. When 

 the intelligence reached Teheran that whole regi- 

 ments had retired en masse without firing a shot 

 without ever having seen the colour of their enemy's 

 moustaches some of the general officers and chiefs of 

 tribes were ordered into the presence, and had there 

 received the punishment of the stick : this accom- 

 plished, the rapacious Prime Minister laid hands upon 

 them, and lightened them of all their ready money 

 and jewel-hilted daggers. The Persian soldiers, who 

 are not to be surpassed by any troops in the world 

 for their endurance of fatigue, and for the length 

 of their marches through an impoverished country, 

 were, for the want of being led by their officers, after 

 a few engagements, ready for immediate flight at the 

 gleam of a British bayonet. Sir James Outram, 

 hampered by the difficulty of procuring baggage- 

 animals, had been obliged to encamp on the plain 

 near Mahamra: this small town is situated on the 

 right bank of the Hafar Canal. At a point a few 

 furlongs distant from the town, the canal joins the 



