'Travels in Assyria, Media, and Persia, including a journey from Bagdad by Mount Zagros, to Hamadan, the ancient Ecbatana, researches in Ispahan and the ruins of Persepolis, and journey from thence by Shiraz and Shapoor to the sea-shore. Description of Bussorah, Bushire, Bahrein, Ormuz, and Muscat, narrative of an expedition against the pirates of the Persian Gulf, with illustrations of the voyage of Nearchus, and passage by the Arabian Sea to Bombay.' [‎243] (274/582)

SEPULCHRE OF SHAH REZA.
243
they had each an English musket, with the East India Company's
mark, and wore a double cross-belt, with a large black cartouch-
box on the right, and a bayonet on the left side, as by English
soldiers. These men at first insolently objected to our entry;
but as we assured them that the only object of our journey
through Persia was to visit the tombs of the venerated champions
of the Faith, adding all we knew of the tomb of Imaum Hussein
at Kerbela, Imaum Moosa at Bagdad, and Imaum Reza at Mushed,
we were ourselves almost venerated as holy personages, and suf
fered without a murmur to pass on.
This sepulchre is that of Shah Reza,-—a name given to one of
the sons of the Imaum Moosa, whose father is said to have had
three hundred wives, at different times and places, and upwards of
a thousand children! No particulars were stated to us of the
life or death of this branch of so holy and prolific a root; those
around us being quite as ignorant as ourselves on these points.
The garden in which his tomj) was seated was exceedingly
pretty, and contained several other buildings, for the accommoda
tion of visitors as well as attendants. In the centre of the upper
court was a large square cistern of solid masonry, filled with clear
water from running streams ; and on the surface of this swam a
proud and favoured drake, followed by his harem of seven milk-
white ducks, the only birds of the kind I had seen since leaving
India, and kept here as if in token of the kind of fame which the
father of the deceased enjoyed in the number of his wives and
children. In another part of this court was a cistern of crystal
water, in which were kept some hundreds of fish, as at Orfah,
Tripoly, and other places near particularly sacred spots ; and as
at these, they were here suffered to procreate their species, ad
infinitum, without any preventing cause, being never disturbed,
always abundantly watered, and constantly well fed. The earliest
of the divine precepts, " Increase and multiply," had been not only
well observed by the family of the honoured saint, but seemed
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