CARAVANSARY OF A SEFI PRINCESS. 
399 
front like a curtain. As they sit with their faces towards the 
head of the animal, these sort of loads have a most singular ap¬ 
pearance at a distance. Our journey was this day seven farsangs ; 
and we reached our caravansary at half-past twelve at noon. 
May 24th. We quitted our lodgings this morning at three 
o’clock, with a moon brilliant as day. By my compass, we were 
going in a direction south 45° east, still upon the plain. At 
four, the dawn broke; and at half-past five we passed a large 
and splendid caravansary, built by the mother of the great Abbas. 
Its foundations are dark-blue marble, surrounded by high and 
massy walls of the finest brick masonry. The tops of the 
towers, and of the walls also, are finished in an extraordinary 
style of elegance, with a sort of open work ; giving a light, and 
almost lace appearance, to the edging of so solid a building. An 
ornament, altogether well-adapted to what we might suppose 
the taste of a lady-foundress. Nearly opposite to this fine struc¬ 
ture, stand the remains of one of those fortified enclosures which 
usually appendaged caravansaries of consequence, (when far from 
villages;) as a walled depot for the forage and other supplies, 
necessary to the accommodation of travellers. 
From this point, we soon began to ascend one of the many 
short ranges of hills, which spotted the immense plain, at dif¬ 
ferent distances. The line we crossed, stretched north-west, 
scarcely a mile and a half in length; and from its summit we 
saw the other groups, forming far separate breaks in the level 
champaign. Having surmounted this screen, we proceeded due 
south, over a tolerable road, and passed the ruins of another 
caravansary, of large dimensions ; but no otherwise remarkable 
than possessing a well, which must be sought at the bottom of 
an excavated way, on a descent of nearly forty yards. Some 
