When I appeared at the King's Gate, and took my seat among the minor officers who awaited the presence of the vizier previously to his going before the Shah, the enemies of England, of whom there were many, would taunt me with the news spread to her disadvantage, for I was looked upon as a Frangi myself. "After all," said one, "own, O Hajji! that these Ingliz are an unclean generation; that it is quite time they should eat their handful of abomination."--"We are tired of always hearing them lauded," said another. "Praised be the Prophet! that little by little we may also defile their fathers' graves, and point our fingers at their mothers." "Why address me, O little man?" said I. "Am I their father, mother, brother, or uncle, that you address me?--It was my destiny to go amongst them; it was my destiny to come back. A fox ds not become a swine because he gs through the ordure of the sty in search of his own affairs. Let their houses be bankrupt, let their fathers grill in Jehanum--what is that to me?" "What words are these?" said a third. "Your beard has changed its colour. What are become of your guns that would reach from Tehran to Kom placed side by side, or to Ispahan placed lengthwise? Where now are your ships that spout more fire than Demawand, and your women like houris that can read and write like men of the law? Formerly there was nothing in the world like Francs; now you look upon them as dirt." Had I persisted in upholding my Ingliz friends, now that the tide had turned against them, I should have done them no good, and myself harm; therefore I applied the cotton of deafness to the ear of unwillingness. Most true, however, it was that they daily lost in public estimation; and rumours of the approaching downfal of English power and prosperity came to us from so many quarters, that we could not do otherwise than believe them. Whenever an Englishman now appeared in the streets, he was called pig with impunity; and, instead of the bastinado which the man who so insulted him formerly was wont to get, he now was left to repeat the insult at his leisure. The fact principally urged was, that a disorder had broken out amongst them, which affected the brain more than any other organ; that it had taken possession of high and low, rich and poor, master and servant; and raged with such violence, that it was almost dangerous to go amongst them, although strangers were said not to catch it. It was neither cholera, plague, nor heart-ache, and could not be assimilated to any known disorder in the East. We have no name for it in Persia; in England it is called _Reform_: and, as it had suddenly attacked the country when in a state of great health and prosperity, it was supposed that some one great evil eye had struck it, and that therefore no one could foresee what might be its mischievous results. CHAPTER II.