نسخة مذيلة من "بلاد فارس والشأن الفارسي" بقلم جورج كرزون، مع أوراق مدرجة [و‎‎٢‎٥‎٩] (١٨١٤/٥٢٠)

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my notes, were the chief contents of the Royal Museum. 1 In a
country that is always bewailing its lack of money, and which
cries aloud for the regeneration that might so easily spring from
the construction or repair of roads, bridges, caravanserais, and
other elementary public works, it can excite but one feeling to
see all this impotent wealth piled up, secreting beneath a glass
case that which should serve to populate entire districts and
to enrich great communities. How much worse is it when we
know that the treasures here displayed do not stand alone, but
are supplemented by hoards of specie and bullion stored in the
vaults below, which the lowest estimate values at three millions ster
ling and the highest I will not say at what figure. Patriotism need
not be so very difficult an attribute in royalty, when it is able to
stop short of the treasure-house and the money-bags.
Below the Museum are a number of vaults, known as the Chinee-
Khaneh, or Porcelain Room, where vast quantities of Sevres,
Dresden, old Worcester, and other porcelain are stored, the gifts of
European sovereigns to the present and preceding kings. There is
also an Aslaheh-Khaneh, or Armoury, containing curious arms, and
the Shah’s rifles and fowling-pieces ; and a gallery wherein is hung
a large collection of the paintings of the late esteemed artist, Abul
Hasan Khan Ghaffari, styled the Sani-el-Mulk. These last-named
apartments I did not see.
On the other side of the top of the staircase is a room, some
times called the Council Chamber, in which I was admitted to a
The private audience by the Shah. It was empty on all the
occasions when I saw it, save for an object standing in
the corner by the window. This was the Takht-i-Taous
or celebrated so-called Peacock Throne, said to have been brought
by Nadir Shah from India in 1739-40, and identified by a long
consensus of writers (I know of no divergent opinion) with the
famous Peacock Throne that stood in the Diwan-i-Kh^s at Delhi
(where its site is still shown) and that was the main ornament of
the glittering court of the Great Mogul. From a study of
all the extant authorities bearing upon the question, I had come
to the conclusion that this claim could not be substantiated, and
that the throne at Teheran, exquisite work of art though it be,
1 Sir H. Jones, in 1810, estimated the value of the Persian Crown Jewels at
15,000,000^. {Mission to Persia, vol. i. p. 384) ; Lord Polling-ton, in 1865, at
40,000,OOOZ.-50,000,000Z. ! {Half Round the World, pp. 229-232).
alleged
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