he was to take, for he could not consent to swallow anything which had been made up by Christian hands. The Persians wash their hands after touching a Christian even by accident, and say a short prayer. They will not allow a Christian to go even to their public baths. They wash a cup three times after he has drank from it. They will not again sit upon the same carpet that he has pressed. But they have learned to know that some of the Franks are angry men; they have seen their most terrible chiefs go down before the Frankish swords like corn before the sickle. They have seen their clouds of innumerable horsemen scattered like dust by the mighty array of Christian armies. They are also a polite and courteous people-the Frenchmen of the East. They are therefore at much pains to reconcile fanaticism, and a fear of the consequences of its exhibition. A Frankish stranger, on entering a Persian house, will probably notice that there is a smart carpet laid down apart in a particular corner of the room for him; that upon the tea-tray there is one particular cup, prettier than the rest, which is offered to him; and that the sherbet is served to him in a glass differing from the others, and probably more costly. All these are devices to conceal the utter loathing with which he is regarded by his host. Their intolerance and superstition are about on a par, as may be supposed. Though they pretend to despise the Christian faith, they like to have a Bible in the room for a sick person. They suppose that it prevents the entrance of evil spirits. A sick person is, moreover, never left alone, for fear of demons. The Persians attribute the frequent earthquakes in their country to the fact that the earth stands upon a great bull, which, being now and then stung by a fly, shakes his head, and thus causes a shock to his burden. The custom of trying a fall-that is to say, of opening the Koran where it will, and taking the first passage that meets the eye for counsel in time of difficulty-is a common practice. They place such implicit faith in it, that they will not take medicine during sickness if the fall is unfortunate. They observe happy hours, and consult astrologers respecting them. Even the king has an astrologer, and the priesthood do not reprove the custom of taking advice from him. Superstitions often become grave matters of state, upon which important affairs may depend. I remember a French ambassador having been conducted in state to the capital, during an awful snowstorm, because it had been declared by the astrologers to be his happy hour. It is the fashion, and a very old one, to keep a pig in the stable of valuable horses, that the evil eye may fall upon him, or demons may play their pranks with him rather than the horses. When a great man is travelling, a sheep or cow, according to his rank, is killed at the entrance of every village through which he passes. The throat of the animal is cut, and the blood allowed to flow across the path, so that his horse may step upon it. Perhaps even the head of the slaughtered animal is thrown across the road as he goes by. It is hoped that the Fates may be thus propitiated, and that any evil which might otherwise have overtaken him will be by these means averted and attracted to the beast. It is not always a cow or a sheep that is selected to take upon itself the evil which might befall a great man. At the marriage of a wealthy and powerful khan, I have heard that a beggar threw himself from a great height, and broke one of his limbs for the same purpose. The khan pensioned him handsomely, If a Persian sneezes when he is about to do anything, he will not do it. The sneeze is looked upon as a warning. The principles and practice of physic are much the same in Persia now as during the dark ages in Europe. The lungs of foxes are given for consumption, rose leaves for melancholy. The general average of longevity is from ten to fifteen years less than in England. Ignorant, savage, intolerant, superstitious, as they are, the Persians are extraordinarily ceremonious. They have even an art of getting up and an art of sitting down, which must in no case be infringed. The Persians do not sit cross-legged like the Turks. They sit upon their knees. To sit cross-legged is considered boorish, unless permission is first asked from the company. On getting up, it is necessary to rise without making any use of the hands. In no country are visits so strictly regulated, and so intolerable a nuisance, as in Persia. A man calls upon you to pass the morning, as if life had no other object than visiting, and as long as time was got rid of, it did not matter how. In conversation they speak low and soft to superiors and equals, loudly and haughtily to inferiors. The person employed to negotiate with Pasley, Sir John Malcolm's secretary, begged to be excused roaring at him in public, declaring that he was obliged to do so by his official rank. Their talk, which is at first amusing, soon becomes wearisome when one gets accustomed to it, and it is dreadfully troublesome in business. Their chief object in talking appears always to clothe nothing in fine phrases and roundabout language. They have a remarkable faculty of finding excuses, and always take the best answer they can invent, wholly irrespective of its truth or falsehood. Sometimes, however, they strike upon a quaint and original idea. 'If I make shoes to last,' said a cobbler to me, 'how am I to live?' And sometimes they hit upon a pretty thought. It is impossible,' said a Persian khan, alluding to a friend who, he was told, had slandered him: 'It is impossible that one I love so much should speak ill of me.' 'What do you mean,' said I once to an ex-ambassador, who had passed a long time in Europe'what do you mean by the salutation, "May your shadow never be less ? "" 'We live,' answered the khan pleasantly, 'under a very hot sun in Persia, and we retire to the shadow for repose and peace. The power of a great man gives rest and tranquillity to many, for none dare to injure or molest those whom he protects. So we call that power his shadow, and hope for our own sakes, as well as his, that it may never diminish.' In spite of bad government, waste, and false ideas of every kind, Persia is still, perhaps, the most prosperous kingdom of the East. The state of agriculture in Persia, for instance, is far better than in Turkey, although it presents the same oriental picture of waste and unthrift. Field labour in Persia is chiefly performed by women, All crops in Persia must be artificially irrigated, as rain seldom falls there during the warm months of the year. The fact that the plains are nearly level facilitates the process. Water is taken by canals from the small rivers that roll down the mountains, and conveyed along near the foot of the declivities. Smaller canals, leading from the main ones, carry it down to prescribed sections of the plain; and these are again subdivided and conducted to particular fields, as it is needed. The openings from the main canals are readily closed when sufficient water is taken out for a given field, and the stream then passes on to cheer and fertilise the thirsty soil of the next neighbour. The ease with which the gardener changes these streams, by closing or opening a channel with his spade, or even with his foot, vividly illustrates the scriptural allusion to divine Sovereignty: The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water. He turneth it whithersoever He will.' If the fields are not level, they must be divided and worked by a spade or plough into level sections, each enclosed within a ridge a few inches high; and these divisions are successively watered. The water privileges are a great subject of contest, each farmer or landowner being entitled to a portion only on particular days or hours of the week; and it often happens towards the close of the summer, when the streams are low, that quarrels arise on the subject, the water being exhausted before it reaches the lower parts of the plain, and then there is a fight. Where streams do not exist, or cannot be readily conducted, wells are in some cases dug, from which water is drawn with a bucket of skin upon a windlass turned by an ox, as in ancient Egypt. In other cases a well is sunk upon a descending plain till a spring is found, and a canal cut from the bottom underground, descending just enough to convey its water along; and a few yards from the first a second well is dug, that the earth, in cutting the subterranean passage, may be drawn out; and the same process is repeated till the spring is conveyed to the surface, and made to irrigate the adjacent fields. The rapidity with which the wells are dug is surprising. Two men -one at the top, with a small hand windlass and a leather bucket to draw up the soil, and the other below with an iron prong, like a tusk furnished with a short handle, to dig it up, and a huge iron spoon with which to fill the bucket--will work down twenty to twenty-five feet per day; and the soil is so dry as to leave no curve nor wall to prevent it from passing. The grist mill is the only species of machinery moved by water in Persia. This is exceedingly simple in its construction, consisting merely of a perpendicular shaft with a water wheel attached to the bottom, and the upper millstone placed upon the top. Water is conveyed from the canal down to the buckets of the wheel by a large spout or trough, dug from the trunk of a tree very narrow at the surface, and often entirely covered over with pieces of board. This spout is placed at an angle of at least forty-five degrees, and, with a head of fifteen to twenty feet, it turns the wheel with prodigious rapidity and power. The Persians, having no means of bolting their flour, sift it with coarse sieves by hand. 'Two women grinding at the mill,' a small hand mill, is still a familiar scene in Persia among the peasants. 94 (3) Divide 4 by 8; by 16. 7 by 6; 11 by 9; & by 5; 2 by 12; (4) 13÷15; 28; 19÷37; 1÷38; 2÷12; 3÷13; 18 15÷27. Reduce to their simplest forms (1) of; of. (3) of; of 4. (2) or 7; of . 1020 THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS. (From The Norman Conquest,' by A. Thierry.) lit-an-y, a public form of supplication hau'-berk, a coat of mail without sleeves re-doubt', a circular fort rel'-ics, remains de'-ci-mate, to destroy one out of every strat'-a-gem, a trick ten dieu aide (Fr.), God help us rav'-ine, a deep narrow valley quar-ter, mercy shown to the conquered des-poil'-ed, plundered ON the ground, which has ever since borne the name of Battle, the lines of the Anglo-Saxons occupied a long chain of hills, fortified by a rampart of stakes and willow hurdles. In the night of October 13 (1066), William announced to the Normans that the next day would be the day of battle. Priests and monks, who had followed the invading army in great numbers, attracted, like the soldiers, by the hope of booty, met to pray and chaunt litanies, while the warriors prepared their arms. The time which remained to them, after this first carol, was employed by them in confessing their sins and receiving the sacrament. In the other army, the night was passed in a very different manner; the Saxons diverted themselves with singing old national songs, and emptying, around their fires, horns filled with beer and wine. When morning came, in the Norman camp, the Bishop of Bayeux, brother, on the mother's side, of Duke William, celebrated mass and blessed the troops, armed with a hauberk under his rochet; he then mounted a large white courser, took a baton of command, and drew up the cavalry. The army was divided into three columns of attack; in the first were the men-at-arms from the counties of Boulogne and Ponthieu, with most of the adventurers engaged individually for pay; in the second were the Breton, Manceaux, and Poitevin auxiliaries; William in person commanded the third, composed of the Norman chivalry. In front and on the flanks of each of these bodies were infantry, lightly armed, wearing quilted coats, and armed with long bows or with steel cross-bows. The duke was mounted on a Spanish charger, which a rich Norman had brought him on his return from a pilgrimage to St. Iago in Galicia. He wore around his neck the most revered of the relics upon which Harold had sworn, and the standard, blessed by the pope, was carried at his side by a young man, named Tonstain le Blanc.' At the moment, ere the troops began their march, the duke, raising his voice, thus addressed them:: Fight your best, and put every one to death; for if we conquer we shall all be rich. What I gain, you gain. If I conquer, you conquer. If I take the land, you will share it. Know, however, that I am not come here merely to take that which is my due, but to revenge our whole nation for the felon |