‘GAZETTEER OF PERSIA VOL. I Comprising the Provinces of ASTARÁBÁD, SHÁHRUD-BÚSTAN, KHÚRÁSÁN, AND SÍSTÁN’ [‎224v] (455/722)

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himself head-over-heels between them; and again, in a second display, turned
himself over with a drawn-sword in his month.
« a negro appeared on the side of a basin of water (in which three fountains
were already playing), and, by a singular faculty which he possessed of
secreting liquids, managed to make himself a sort of fourth fountain by
spouting water from his mouth. We closely observed him. He drank two
basins and a quarter of water, each holding about four quarts; and he was
five minutes spouting them out. Next came an eater of fire. This man
brought a large dishful of charcoal, which he placed deliberately before
him, and then, taking up the pieces, conveyed them, bit by bit, successively
into his mouth, and threw them out again, when the fire was extinguished.
He then took a piece, from which he continued to blow the most brilliant
sparks for more than half-an-hour. The trick consists in putting in the
mouth some cotton dipped in the oil of naphtha, on which the pieces of
charcoal are laid, and from which they derive the strength of their fire. Now,
the flame of this combustible is known to be little calid. Another man put
into his mouth two balls alternately, which burnt with a brilliant flame, and
which also were soaked in the same fluid.
u The music was of the roughest kind. The performers were seated in a
row round the basin of water. The band consisted of—two men, who played
the ‘ kamancha/ a species of violin; four, who beat the tamborine ; one,
who thrummed the guitar; one, who played on the spoons ; and two, who
sang. The loudest in the concert were the songsters, who, when they
applied the whole force of their lungs, drowned every other instrument.
The man with the spoons seemed to me the most ingenious and least discord
ant of the whole band. He placed two wooden spoons in a neat and
peculiar manner betwixt the fingers of his left hand, whilst he beat them
with another spoon in his right.
“ All this continued till the twilight had fairly expired, when there com
menced a display of fireworks on a larger scale than any that I recollect
to have seen in Europe. In the first place, the director of the works caused
to be thrown into the fountain before us a variety of fires, which were fixed
on square, flat boards, and which, bursting into the most splendid streams
and stars of flame, seem to put the water in one entire blaze. He then
threw up some beautiful bluelights ; and finished the whole by discharging
immense volleys of rockets, which had been fixed in stands, each of twenty
rockets, in different parts of the garden, and particularly on the summits of
the walls. Each stand exploded at once ; and at one time the greater part of
all the rockets were in the air at the same moment, and produced an effect
grand beyond the powers of description.
“ At the end of this exhibition a band of choice musicians and songsters
was introduced into the particular apartment where we were seated. A
player on the ‘ kamancha 3 really drew forth notes which might have done
credit to the better instruments of the West; and the elastic manner with
which he passed his bow across the strings convinced me that he himself
WO uld have been an accomplished performer, even among those of Europe,
if his ear had been tutored to the harmonies and delicacies of our science.
The notes of their guitar corresponded exactly to those of our instrument.
Another sang some of the odes of Hafiz, accompanied by the f kamancha,
and in a chorus by the tamborines.
“ After this concert, some parts of which were extremely noisy and some
not unpleasant even to our ears, appeared from behind a curtain a dirty-