INTEMPERANCE OF THE SEFI KINGS. 
415 
firm in his stirrups, and as life-like in visage, as the most con¬ 
quering hero in the piece. 
Ridiculous as the execution of these pictures may be in some 
respects, they are invaluable as registers of the manners of the 
times, of the general aspect of the persons they are designed to 
commemorate, and of the costumes of the several nations as¬ 
sembled at the feasts, or engaged in the battles. Large turbans, 
full mustachios, and smooth-shaven chins, were then the fashion 
in Persia; which has now given place to the high, narrow, black 
cap of sheep-skin, and the long bushy beard : the latter ap¬ 
pendage having been a costume of the empire many centuries 
before. 
The sixth large picture is of more modern date, and a very 
sorry specimen of the art indeed. It is meant to represent a 
victory of Nadir Shah’s, over the sovereign of Delhi; and was 
painted during that usurper’s reign. All the smaller pictures 
pourtray scenes of the most licentious revelry. It is not neces¬ 
sary to attribute the worst of these to the reign of Shah Abbas; 
for though he was addicted to wine and wassail, as extravagantly, 
perhaps, as any of his most intemperate European guests, yet 
we do not find that his personal conduct, in other respects, par¬ 
took of the open, wanton libertinism, which stained the lives of 
most of his descendants. To the profligate taste, then, of his 
grandson Shah Sefi, I would attribute the very disgraceful me¬ 
morials of the manners of the times. But had his artists, and 
their successors, pourtrayed the sanguinary scenes, which were 
also the effects of these drunken revels; himself, his ancestors, and 
his posterity, would have been seen committing deeds of mad 
inebriation, which make the murder of Clytus a venial crime; and 
must have proved, by such visible warning, the most decisive 
