SITUATION OF BAGDAD FOR COMMERCE. * 265 
Feodor’s grave; and, that I had brought him so far, to lay him 
there, was not, perhaps, the least of my pangs. 
The circumference of the walls, embracing the whole city of 
Bagdad, including all its buildings on both sides of the Tigris, 
is computed to be about five miles. Six gates enter them ; 
three on one bank of the river, and three on the other. But 
the bulwarks are more numerous on one side than on the other ; 
a hundred and seventeen towers strengthening the walls on the 
eastern quarter, while only thirteen are observable on the west. 
Thickly built, and crowded, as the streets appear, little of civic 
magnificence shews itself. Few of the ancient public buildings 
remain, and not a vestige of the palace of the caliphs is visible. 
The present pasha’s residence seems a very humble dwelling for 
their successor. The existing population of Bagdad, I should 
think, can scarcely exceed 100,000 people ; the number of its 
inhabitants, together with the national consequence of the city, 
having been long on the decay : and its frequent changes of mas¬ 
ters, with the calamities usually attending those events from Asiatic 
conquerors, may well account for such a decline. Massacre, 
devastation, and oppression, have ransacked this city during 
several hundred years; and yet it bears a name, and a certain 
respectability in the East, solely from the circumstance of its 
situation being a central depot; or rather, with more propriety, 
we might call it “ the still important great caravansary of Asia 
from its lying on the main road of traffic between so many dis¬ 
tant countries, to receive, and protect, and set forward on their 
business, all the merchants and merchandise which pass to and 
fro, from 
Indus to the Nile, 
Or Caspian wave, and Oman’s rocky shore. 
VOL. II. 
M M 
