'A second journey through Persia, Armenia, and Asia Minor, to Constantinople, between the years 1810 and 1816. With a journal of the voyage by the Brazils and Bombay to the Persian Gulf. Together with an account of the proceedings of His Majesty's embassy under Sir Gore Ouseley, Bart. K.L.S. With two maps, and engravings from the designs of the author.' [‎177] (220/516)

ERECTION OF TENTS.
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which were forbidden to the Israelites by Moses*; and these extrava
gancies, I conjecture, must resemble the practices of the priests of Baal,
who cried aloud and cut themselves after this manner with knives and
lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. 1 Kings, xviii. 28. See also
Jeremiah, xvi. 5, 6, and 7.
The preparations which were made throughout the city consisted in
erecting large tents, that are there called takieh, in the streets and open
places, in fitting them up with black linen, and furnishing them with
objects emblematical of the mourning. These tents are erected
either at the joint expence of the mahal, or district, or by men of
consequence, as an act of devotion; and all ranks of people have a
free access to them. The expense of a takieh consists in the hire of a
mollah, or priest, of actors and their clothes, and in the purchase of lights.
Many there are who seize this opportunity of atoning for past sins, or
of rendering thanks to heaven for some blessing, by adding charity to
the good act of erecting a takieh, and distribute gratuitous food to
those who attend it.
Our neighbour Mahomed Khan had a takieh in his house, to
which all the people of the mahal flocked in great numbers. During
the time of this assemblage we heard a constant noise of drums,
cymbals, and trumpets. We remarked that besides the takiehs in
different open places and streets of the town, a wooden pulpit, with
out any appendage, was erected, upon which a mollah was mounted,
preaching to the people who were collected around him. To speak
occasionally from a pulpit was one of the offices of the early suc
cessors of Mahomed, who joined in their persons the sacred and
royal character. In process of time this function passed to inferior
persons. An European Ambassador who is said to have intrigued with
Yezid in favour of Hossein, is brought forwards accordingly to be an
actor in one of the parts of the tragedy, and the populace were in
consequence inclined to look favourably upon us. Notwithstanding the
excitation of the public mind, we did not cease to take our usual rides,
* Levit. xix. 28. Deut. xiv. 1.
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