Shame is the feeling of vexation consequent upon the consciousness of having fallen below an accepted standard of conduct, and where such a standard is not to be found, shame does not exist. Consequently the Yezdi, who has only the faintest idea of a moral standard that ought to govern his whole life, is not susceptible to shame in this particular. He has, however, a rather stronger idea of a general standard of intelligence up to which he ought to live, so it is often a greater deterrent to him to point out that a certain action will be regarded as ignorant or silly than to show that it is less moral than his ordinary behaviour. He also possesses a very keen appreciation of what he considers to be the ethical proprieties of a particular occasion. We must remember that what he lacks in breadth of view he makes up for in power of concentration on the comparatively small field of ideas that can come simultaneously within the range of his mental vision. For example, when European missionaries have been in vain attempting to simplify a most abstruse and metaphysical doctrine by spreading it over several easy steps, they sometimes find that the Persian mind, though it utterly fails to grasp the simpler train of reasoning, can without any assistance take in the more difficult idea, so long as it is expressed with sufficient brevity. In the same way the Yezdi, who seems to have little or no sense of the proprieties of a lifetime, will have an appreciation of what is right and fitting on a particular occasion stronger than that of the European. This is what makes him so dignified at times and seasons, and so undignified in his life. Although his sense of propriety does not always work, where it does work it is so far from being weak that to violate it seems to give him a sensation that is near akin to physical pain. You cannot make a Yezdi apologise: if he has done an injury, he is quite content to ignore it, or to assert that it has not taken place, which is the ordinary substitute for an apology in Persia: but the man’s sense of shame is too great to allow him to confess to such an action before the man he has wronged. He has no objection to the man knowing what has happened; but at the interview his denial must be accepted or the injury ignored. This is the only way in which he can submit to the meeting.