Long conversations in Persian and Hindustani abridged the tediousness
of the voyage, and when we arrived at Bulak, the polite Khudabakhsh
insisted upon my making his house my home. I was unwilling to accept
the man's civility, disliking his looks; but he advanced cogent reasons
for changing my mind. His servant cleared my luggage through the
custom-house, and a few minutes after our arrival I found myself in his
abode near the Azbakiyah Gardens, sitting in a cool Mashrabiyah[FN#8]
that gracefully projected over a garden, and sipping the favourite
glass of pomegranate syrup.
As the Wakalahs or Caravanserais were at that time full of pilgrims, I
remained with Khudabakhsh ten days or a fortnight. But at the end of
that time my patience was thoroughly exhausted. My host had become a
civilised man, who sat on chairs, who ate with a fork, who talked
European politics, and who had learned to admire, if not to understand,
liberty-liberal ideas! and was I not flying from such things? Besides
which, we English have a