24 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



the gateway, affecting the airs of a man of some con- 

 sequence, he suddenly sneezed : whether it was some 

 tobacco that my servant was pounding for the pipe, 

 or whether it was the dust eddying through the gate 

 that blew against him, I know not, but sneeze he did, 

 and the effect was disastrous. With the journey in 

 prospect, the omen was evidently an inauspicious one. 

 He stopped as if he had been shot. There was only 

 one way of charming away the evil mishap, and that 

 he instantly adopted. Hanging his arms down close 

 along his sides, he turned the elbows slightly for- 

 wards, and then he blew carefully first over the right 

 shoulder and then over the left. But even this cere- 

 mony, performed as if his very life depended upon it, 

 did not seem to give the hoped-for relief. He walked 

 away, but quantum mutatis ab illo, he slunk off 

 like one who dared not venture on a look behind 

 him. His appearance had imdergone such a sudden 

 change, and he looked altogether so chopfallen, that, 

 do what I could, it was impossible to prevent my 

 laughter reaching his ears as he rode away. I am 

 quite sure he never forgave me my hard-heartedness. 

 The next afternoon I thought I would go and say 

 good-bye to an old Mirza, a man of some wealth, 

 which he had made in the service of our Govern- 

 ment in India. He had been very civil to us during 

 our stay at Shiraz. As I rode up one of the very 

 narrow streets leading to his house indeed, nothing 

 more than a narrow passage between high bank 



