PLANS OF NATIONAL IMPROVEMENT. 507 
establishments, being under the immediate eye and direction of 
a very able artificer and intelligent man, Mr. Armstrong. 
Brass guns of various calibre are cast and bored; also car¬ 
riages, tumbrils, and every thing else attached to artillery, are 
constructed on the spot; and the department altogether con¬ 
ducted with an execution and celerity, considering the tools and 
workmen, quite astonishing. At Koiy, the prince has lately 
put up a fulling-mill. The machinery at first was a subject of 
amazement only, to the people; but daily becoming used to 
the extraordinary mechanical powers of its European inventors, 
they duly appreciated the utility of this, in the manufacture of 
their coarse woollen cloths. But wishing that his people should 
taste the advantages of mental cultivation in themselves, and 
therefore become more lastingly serviceable in the improvement 
of their country, he has sent over six or seven young Persians 
to England, to study, at his expence, medicine, and several 
branches of the arts and sciences, of the most apparent use to 
his future kingdom. The Shah, whose natural dispositions are 
not less urbane than his son’s, approves of whatever he does ; 
and having pronounced him his heir, contemplates, with a noble 
complacency, rare in almost any monarch, the hand of his suc¬ 
cessor sowing the seeds of future power and greatness. But 
between the death of one Persian monarch and the accession 
. of another, there is generally so much competition ; such civil 
war, bloodshed, and assassination, that it is possible the demise 
of Futteh Ali Shah, instead of continuing a happy tranquillity, 
may again throw open the temple of Janus; Mahmoud Ali 
Mirza having threatened to dispute the throne with this his 
brother ; and in that case, the issue being doubtful, the now 
emerging civilization of the people, may again be cast back into 
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