PERSIAN FLATTERY. 
57 
injunction was, “ Be sure that you give him plenty of flattery.” However, 
they know the real value of it as well as we; for at the same time he 
turned round to me, and said, You know it is necessary, ree^h-khun- 
dish bekuneem,^^-—-to laugh at his beard, or in other words to humbug him. 
Among themselves they practise the same sort of deceit; and although 
they are in general aware of the value of the praise which they receive, 
yet it does not fail to stimulate their vanity, which as far back as the 
time of Herodotus appears to have been a national vice; for he says, 
“ they esteem themselves the most excellent of mankind.” In the em¬ 
bassy of Sir Harford Jones, I once witnessed the introduction of one 
Persian to another,^—the principal Alirza of the embassy to the King’s 
chief jeweller. What,” said the jeweller, is this the celebrated Aga 
Meer, that learned, that ingenious man, that famous penman ?” and 
then went through such a quick enumeration of virtues, qualities, per¬ 
sonal charms, and family distinctions, that the Alirza at first appeared 
quite overwhelmed; but little by little he recovered, and returned so 
brisk a fire of compliments, as almost to annihilate the jeweller. 
On paying a visit to Alirza Abul Hassan Khan, we were surprised to 
find his room darkened, himself seated in a corner weeping aloud, and 
apparently in the greatest grief. The cause was easily to be guessed; 
for we had been informed, nearly on our first landing, that his only 
child, a son of four years old, had died during his father’s absence of 
the small-pox; and this circumstance, by order of the King, had been 
hitherto kept from his knowledge. A young eunuch belonging to the 
Prince’s mother, ignorant of the King’s orders, had heedlessly men¬ 
tioned it to him, and thus destroyed at once the hopes he had so long 
cherished, during his absence, of seeing what he held most dear to him. 
He felt his misfortune the more, as his wife was too old to encourage 
the hope of any more offspring, and moreover was so jealous, as to 
oppose a second marriage. She is a lady of superior rank to himself, 
being the daughter of Hajee Ibrahim, the late Grand Vizier of Persia; 
and it is said, that if her husband in any manner ill-treated her, she 
* Clio, 134. 
I 
