this time going forward here (at Lucknow) with
all that zealous emulative spirit and enthusiasm which I have before
remarked the Mussulmaun population of India entertain for their Emaums
(leaders), and their religion.

This annual solemn display of the regret and veneration they consider due
to the memory of departed excellence, commences on the first day of the
Moon (Mahurrum). The Mussulmaun year has twelve moons; every third year
one moon is added, which regulation, I fancy, renders their years, in a
chronological point of view, very nearly equal with those of Europe. Their
day commences and ends when the stars are first visible after sunset.

The first day of Mahurrum invariably brings to my recollection the
strongly impressed ideas of 'The Deserted Village'. The profound quiet and
solemn stillness of an extensively populated native city, contrasted with
the incessant bustle usual at all other times, are too striking to
Europeans to pass by unheeded. This cessation of the animated scene,
however, is not of long duration; the second day presents to the view vast
multitudes of people parading backwards and forwards, on horseback, in
palkies, and on foot, through the broad streets and roadways, arrayed in
their several mourning garbs, speeding their way to the Emaum-baarahs[1]
of the great men, and the houses of friends, to pay the visit of respect
(zeearut), wherever a Tazia is set up to the remembrance of Hasan and
Hosein.

The word Tazia[2] signifies grief. The term is applied to a representation
of the mausoleum at Kraabaallah, erected by their friends and followers,
over the remains of Hasan and Hosein. It is formed of every variety of
material, according to the wealth, rank, or preference, of the person
exhibiting, from the purest silver down to bamboo and paper, strict
attention being always paid to preserve the model of Kraabaallah, in the
exact pattern with the original building. Some people have them of ivory,
ebony, sandal-wood, cedar, &c., and I have seen some beautifully wrought
in silver filigree. The handsomest of the kind, to my taste, is in the
possession of his Majesty the King of Oude, composed of green glass, with
brass mouldings, manufactured in England (by whom I could not learn). All
these expensive Tazias are fixtures, but there are temporary ones required
for the out-door ceremony, which, like those available to the poor and
middling classes, are composed of bamboo frames, over which is fixed