470 
CORDIAL RECEPTION BY THE PEASANTRY. 
Lower Eklett, where we halted, is distant from Koosh at five 
farsangs. Our quarters here did not present us so agreeable 
an entertainer; but they were in a garden, with my chamber 
close to one of the pleasant little brooks I have mentioned ; and 
the shade and the water made up for every deficiency. Not 
that we had any reason to complain of our reception at Eklett. 
It was the more than ordinary hospitality of the Moullah Basheh, 
that made our present menzil suffer by comparison. Indeed, 
wherever we have halted during our march from Teheran, whether 
in or near a village, and where the Shah’s rackam was to give 
free lodgings to the bearer and his train, a letter of recommend¬ 
ation not the most agreeable we may suppose to the people, 
still 1 seldom had cause to find fault with the treatment 
bestowed on myself and followers. We were almost invariably 
well received by the natives of every village under the rule 
of a Ketkhoda, or magistrate. A proof that these personages 
of local authority are not in general tyrannical, or extortioners 
in their sway ; else, though we might have found obedience to 
His Majesty’s mandate, it would have been paid with that 
grudging sullenness which sufficiently demonstrates the tribute 
of compulsion ; but, on the contrary, the people have been 
ready in look and alacrity, as well as substance; complying with 
the rackam without a murmur. Refractoriness, however, we 
did sometimes meet; and, on recollecting two or three anecdotes 
of my well-remembered purveyor, in my mind the poor creatures 
were very excusable. But, in most cases, no signs of demurring 
appeared, except in places where we did not find a Ketkhoda, 
and the inhabitants had been left in some degree to their own 
management. Independent of the hourly checks of a resident 
authority, in such cases they generally lost their good manners. 
