Rensselaer Republican, Volume 15, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 August 1883 — How To Live in Persia. [ARTICLE]

How To Live in Persia.

To magnify one’s own consequence is ‘the only comfortable way of getting on in Persia. Dr. Wills gives a characteristic illustration of this in the course of a description of a medical visit to a certain Governor: “At 7, after having prescri’ted for him, I escaped to my quarters under the pretext of dining, and lay down to rest. At 9 my servant informed me that my dinner was about to be served, and a large, circular trav, having some six dishes on it, and with bread and all et ceteras, a huge bowl of iced sherbet and a bottle of wine, was brought in. I was very hungry, anxious to fall to, and I felt a sense of anguish when, to my astonishment, my servant (whom I had brought from Shiraz), assuming the part of the Governor of Barataria’s physician, ordered the whole away, in an indignant voice.” As soon as my dinner had disappeared I demanded an explanation of my man. It was this: “I know, sahib, that the dinner I sent away was quite enough for the sahib, and a good dinner; but here in Persia man’s position is reckoned by the quantity, of dinner sent him and the number oi plats. They have sent you six plats. L have told them that you couldn’t think of dining on less than eighteen, and if I allowed you to eat the dinner that was sent, good as it was, you would be looked down on. Are you less than the Prince’s physician ? Certainly not. They would send him, or rather he would demand, at least twelve plats. I assure you lam acting in your interest.” “I suppose the fellow was right. Dinner for at least twenty-four persons was brought on three huge trays. I tasted some half-dozen well-cooked dishes, and then my servant removed the rest, and I observed him, with the master of the house and numerous hangers-on, dining in the c%>en air on the very copious dinner that remained. The man was right. Such are some of the ways a Persian has of keeping up his consequence.” Living in Persia is of a delightful cheapness. Dr. Wills occupied in Julfa a handsome and convenient house, which cost him altogether about S4OO. He lived luxuriously in Ispahan, keeping ten servants (at a cost of only SSO a month), for only $2,500 a year. —The Land of the Lion.