ecognizable state with
mud, feeling pretty thoroughly disgusted with the weather and the roads,
an ancient-looking Persian emerges from a little stall with a last
season's muskmelon in hand, and advancing toward me, shouts, "H-o-i"
loud enough to wake the seven sleepers. Shouting "H-o-i!!" at a person
close enough to hear a whisper, as loud as though he were a good mile
away, is a peculiarity of the Persians that has often irritated
travellers to the pitch of wishing they had a hot potato and the
dexterity to throw it down their throats; and in my present unenviable
condition, and its accompanying unenviable frame of mind, I don't mind
admitting that I mentally relegated this vociferous melon-vender to a
place where infinitely worse than hot potatoes would overtake him.
Knowing full well that a halt of a single minute would mean a general
mustering of the population, and an importuning rabble following me
through the unridable mud, I ignore the old melon-man's foghorn efforts
to arrest my onward progress; but he proves a most vociferous and
persistent specimen of his class. Nothing less than a dozen exclamation
points can give the faintest idea of how a "hollering" Persian shouts
"H-o-i."

Seven miles over very good gravel, and my road leads into the labyrinth
of muddy lanes, ditches, and water-holes, tumble down walls, and
disorderly-looking cemeteries of the suburbs of Semnoon. In traversing
the cemeteries, one cannot help observing how many of the graves are
caved in by the rains and the skeletons exposed to view. Mohammedans bury
their dead very shallow, usually about two feet, and in Persia the grave
is often arched over with soft mud bricks; these weaken and dissolve
after the rains and snows of winter, and a cemetery becomes a place of
exposed remains and of pitfalls, where an unwary step on what appears
solid ground may precipitate one into the undesirable company of a
skeleton. By the time Semnoon is reached the day has grown warmer, and
the sun favors the cold, dismal earth with a few genial rays, so that the
blooming orchards of peach and pomegranate that brighten and enliven the
environs of the city, and which suggest Semnoon to be a mild and
sheltered spot, seem quite natural, notwithstanding the patches of snow
lying about. The crowds seem remarkably well behaved as I trundle through
the bazaar toward the telegraph office, the total absence of missiles
being particularly noticeable. The telegraph-jee prove