rtains of the carriage, I
arrived at Kum (3,200 feet above sea level) in the middle of the night.
The distance covered between Teheran and Kum was twenty-four farsakhs, or
ninety-six miles.

As we approached the holy city there appeared to be a lot of vegetation
around, and Sadek and the coachman assured me that this was a region
where pomegranates were grown in profusion, and the castor-oil plant,
too. Cotton was, moreover, cultivated with success.

Kum is, to my mind, and apart from its holiness, one of the few really
picturesque cities of Persia. I caught the first panoramic glimpse of the
shrine and mosque at sunrise from the roof of the post house, and was
much impressed by its grandeur. Amidst a mass of semi-spherical mud
roofs, and beyond long mud walls, rise the gigantic gilded dome of the
mosque, two high minarets, and two shorter ones with most beautifully
coloured tiles inlaid upon their walls, the general effect of which is of
most delicate greys, blues and greens. Then clusters of fruit trees,
numerous little minarets all over the place, and ventilating shafts above
the better buildings break the monotony agreeably.

Kum, I need hardly mention, is one of the great pilgrimages of
Mahommedans. Happy dies the man or woman whose body will be laid at rest
near the sacred shrine, wherein--it is said--lie the remains of Matsuma
Fatima. Corpses are conveyed here from all parts of the country. Even
kings and royal personages are buried in the immediate neighbourhood of
the shrine. Round the city there are thousands of mud graves, which give
quite a mournful appearance to the holy city. There are almost as many
dead people as living ones in Kum!

Innumerable Mullahs are found here who are very conservative, and who
seem to resent the presence of European visitors in the city. Access to
the shrine is absolutely forbidden to foreigners.

Immense sums of money are brought daily to the holy city by credulous
pilgrims, but no outward signs of a prosperous trade nor of fine streets
or handsome private buildings can be detected on inspecting the bazaar or
streets of the town. On the contrary, the greater part of the residences
are in a hopeless state of decay, and the majority of the inhabitants, to
all appearance, little above begging point.

Leather, tanned with the bark of the pomegranate, and cheap pottery are
the chief industries of the holy city. On inquiring what becomes of all
the wealth that comes into the to