'Through Persia on a side-saddle' [‎58] (89/360)

58
THROUGH PERSIA ON A SIDE-SADDLE
of exposure of the dead. These are towers erected on the
summit of hills, and we climbed a rocky spot to get a view
of the older dakhma, which was merely a large, square,
low-walled enclosure, full of bleached bones and skulls;
but the new one was more carefully built, so that not even
the most curious eye could get a glimpse of the relics of
mortality within its high walls, and it had one small door
through which the bodies are carried to be eaten by the
ever-expectant vultures and crows.
These old fire-worshipping inhabitants of the land, Gabres
(infidels), as they are called in Persia, believe that if the
birds pluck out the right eye of the corpse first it is a sign
that the man's soul is in bliss, but if it unfortunately
happens that the left eye is given a prior claim, then the
survivors are forced to hold gloomy views regarding the
future residence of the deceased.
The men who carry the dead to these Towers of Silence
are unclean ; and so afraid are Parsees of incurring con
tamination by coming in contact with a corpse, that they
often leave the dying untended towards the last, lest these
latter expire while their friends are in the act of touching
them ; and they hold that they are defiled if they so much
as brush against the wall of the dakhma. A dog is usually
called in to decide whether a Parsee is dead or not. A
piece of bread is placed on the breast of the supposed
corpse, and if the canine arbitrator devours this, it is a
sure sign that life is extinct!
While at Yezd a Parsee deputation waited on my
brother. Eight venerable leaders of that race arrived—
fine old men, but attired in coats and turbans of a hideous
shade of mustard brown. Their Mahommedan oppressors
will not permit them to wear the flowing abba, or Persian