- tions, while Forster was to furnish water; a laborious
task, there being none that was good at a nearer distance than a mile. This man, a gloomy, mysterious person, soon departed for Herat; and the traveller, together with a new companion, contrived likewise to find a better apartment. This second associate was a moollah, whose profession it was to vend certain spells, which were powerfully efficacious in conferring every species of worldly happiness, and in excluding all evils. But
Nolint: atqui licet esse beatis.
The Persians of these parts had no taste for happiness;
so that this modern Thermander was, when
Forster met him, so thoroughly disgusted with his
attempts at banishing all misery from among his
countrymen, that he was willing, he said, to shut
up his book should any other prospect of a maintenance
be held out to him. When our traveller
offered him a participation of his fare, he therefore
joyfully quitted his profession as a wholesale dealer
in happiness, and consented to superintend the labours
of the kitchen, in which, by long practice, he
had attained a remarkable proficiency. "The excellent
services of my companion," says Forster,
"now left me at liberty to walk about the town,
collect information, and frequent the public baths.
In the evening we were always at home; when the
moollah, at the conclusion of our meal, either read
the story of Yousuf and Zuleikha, which he did but
lamely, or, opening his book of spells, he would expound
the virtues of his nostrums, which embraced
so wide a compass that few diseases of mind or
body could resist their force. They extended from
recalling to the paths of virtue the steps of a frail
wife, and silencing the tongue of a scolding one, to
curing chilblains and destroying worms."
While Forster and the moollah were enjoying this peaceful and pleasant life, a large body of pilgrims
