'A Journey through Persia, Armenia, and Asia Minor, to Constantinople, in the years 1808 and 1809, in which is included some account of the proceedings of his Majesty's Mission, under Sir Harford Jones, Bart., to the Court of the King of Persia. With twenty-five engravings from the designs of the author; a plate of inscriptions; and three maps.' [‎34] (69/524)

34 RESIDENCE OF THE MISSION AT BUSHIRE.
during our residence on the spot, and there was, therefore, little direct
political intercourse between the Envoy and the Nasakchee Bashee, (the
Chief Executioner), who superintended those changes: yet as that
officer was the ostensible representative of the Government of Shiraz,
some communications naturally took place. Before the assumption of
the administration of Bushire, (while the Khans object was yet unat-
tained), there was in this intercourse little unsatisfactory; but in his
later conduct to the mission, there was something of the insolence of
newly acquired power; he sent word more than once that he was
coming to pay a visit to the Envoy, and as frequently neglected his
engagement. At length he arrived, puffing in great haste; and as soon
as he had seated himself, he pulled off his black sheep-skin cap, and
begun to read a paper which he took from his pocket. The Envoy
asked him, if he were reading a firman A Persian word meaning a royal order or decree issued by a sovereign, used notably in the Ottoman Empire (sometimes written ‘phirmaund’). from the court, which ordered
him to sit bald-headed. The reproof startled him, and the Envoy con
tinued ; that, representing as he did his Sovereign, he could not permit
the Khan to do in his presence an act of disrespect which he would not
do before his equals, and much less before his superiors. The Khan
immediately put on his cap, and in his shame waved his hand for his
attendants to withdraw. Sir Harford also ordered his own Persians
to retire, and as the suite were in succession leaving the room the Khan
had some leisure to digest the well-timed rebuke.
The notice which the Envoy had been thus obliged to take of an ap
parent disrespect in the Khans conduct was the more necessary, as He
had that morning received a letter from the Prince at Shiraz, the form
and terms of which required some explanation; and on which, there-
44 This is a very rare instance of the successful assumption by an European of an Eastern
^character. I have known, in Turkey, several renegado Englishmen, who could never
* isufficiently disguise themselves to be taken for original Mussulmans."
It must be understood, however, that T alamash is believed to have been born at Con
stantinople, of a French father indeed, yet from his earliest youth to have been unfettered
by a conformity to European usages.