REVIEW. — MOORCROFT’ S TRAVELS. 
279 
authority at Delhi he deeply resented, and addressed him a letter, 
of which some extracts may seem to mark the warmth of his feel- 
ings, both of resentment and gratitude. 
***** 
“ ‘When my days were racked with anxiety, my nights passed 
in sleeplessness, — when I saw only a refuge from loss of charac- 
ter in the miserable expedient of selling merchandise at one-third 
of its value, from a general combination of Kashmeri against me, — 
Providence raised up a friend in a native of Khojand, a trader of 
Yackland, whose feelings of respect for British merchants, im- 
pressed by accounts related to him in Russia, induced him to ad- 
vance money to relieve my embarrassment.’ ” 
***** 
Mr. Moorcroft remained at Bokhara nearly five months. 
***** 
“ He was received by the king with as much kindness as could 
be expected from Ahi Hyder — a selfish, sensual, and narrow- 
minded bigot; and after various diffiulties, arising from the mean- 
ness and cupidity, chiefly of the monarch himself, disposed of part 
of his goods, and effected the purchase of a number of valuable 
horses, with which he purposed to return to Hindustan. After 
crossing the Oxus, on his way back, about the 4th or 5th of 
August 1825, Mr. Moorcroft determined to deviate from the road, 
in order to go to Maimana, where he understood it was likely that 
he should be able to make important additions to his stock of 
horses. ‘ Before I quit Turkistan,’ he writes from Bokhara, ‘I 
mean to penetrate into that tract which contains, probably, the 
best horses in Asia, but with which all intercourse has been sus- 
pended during the last five years. The experiment is full of 
hazard, but lejeu vaut bien la chandelle .’ His life fell a sacrifice 
to his zeal. At Andhko, where he spent some days in effecting 
purchases, he was taken ill with fever, and died. 
Of the particular circumstances of his death there is no satis- 
factory account, as he had quitted his party, and was attended by 
a few servants only, and a son of Wasir Ahmed, a Pirzada, or 
Mahommedan of a religious character, who had replaced Mir Jyzel 
Ullah as his native secretary and interpreter. It was reported that 
he had been poisoned ; but there is no reason to believe that this 
was the case, although he had fallen amongst robbers, who seized 
upon his property, and put his followers into confinement. Such 
was the luckless fate of an individual who, whatever may be 
thought of his prudence or judgment, must ever stand high amongst 
travellers for his irrepressible ardour, his cheerful endurance, his 
inflexible perseverance in the prosecution of his objects, and his 
disinterested zeal for the credit and prosperity of his country. 
