502 
TACKT-I-POOSH, OR PLACES OF REFUGE 
scene by their incessant howls and barking. These sounds have 
often been the first intimation to me of the cause of alarm ; our 
countrymen in the prince’s service having constructed their 
winter-rooms on a plan of comparative security against the com¬ 
mon effects of earthquake. By a particular intersection of the 
beams of wood which support that part of their residence, it 
yields to the heavings of the earth like a mass of wicker-work, and 
hitherto has escaped injury from even the severest shocks. An 
apartment thus constructed is called Tackt-i-poosh ; and when 
seated there in convivial meeting, the cry of distress could be 
the only warning of an apprehension we were so situated as not 
to feel. The prince has since adopted the same precaution in 
the erection of a suit of apartments in his palace, where he and 
the female part of his family usually inhabit at Tabreez ; and it 
cannot be doubted that the plan will be gradually diffused over 
the city. At present the whole environs, for more than a mile 
round the walls, are covered with overturned houses, mosques, 
&c. half buried amongst the shattered rocks which mingle in 
every direction with torn heaps of earth and ruins. But it is 
not to escape any part of the distress to which his capital is 
exposed, that Abbas Mirza leaves it at this season, he returns 
long before the time of its threatened dangers is over. It is his 
custom to divide his own personal vigilance amongst the leading 
places of his government. During his absence from Tabreez, 
Mirza Bezourk, his kyme makaum, or principal minister of 
state, performs all the official duty here as his representative; 
while either the young prince his son, or his youngest brother, 
sustain the daily ceremonies of the court, and in his name place 
their seals to every public act. 
One of the most active officers is the hakim ; which title, in 
