These dervishes, amongst the Persians of all classes, have a great reputation for sanctity. The rich help them liberally, and even the very poor will not turn a deaf ear to their request for aid. One of them chattered away like a magpie, recounting adventures which were not always of the kind one is prone to associate with the austerity of a Religious Order. They had come on foot from Meshed in Eastern Persia to Teheran, Hamadan, and Kermanshah, and were now bound for Kerbela and the Shi'ite holy places in the vicinity of Bagdad. The burdens of life sat lightly on their shoulders, and the destroying hand of care had left no traces upon their merry, laughing faces. They were a cheery trio, {99} forgetful of yesterday, unmindful of to-morrow, and living only for to-day. They were full of a pleasant inquisitiveness, and withal as simple as children. "Were there dervishes across the big water in Faringistan (Europe), and had the man-birds (aviators) come to Bagdad?" they asked. I told them they would see plenty of "man-birds" and "wonder-houses" (cinemas) down yonder in Bagdad, but that an itinerant Persian dervish would be a _rara avis_ amongst our benighted folk, not one, so far as I knew, having yet shed the light of his countenance upon our slow-going old Western world. With a small cash contribution oh my part towards the expenses of their journey, and on theirs the formal invocation of the blessing of Allah upon my head, the dervishes and I exchanged cordial adieux, and parted company on the summit of the Chihar Zabar. Our next halting-place was at Mahidast, a walled town which stands in the midst of an immense plain seventy miles long by ten broad. It is one of the most fertile tracts in Persia, and grows great crops of wheat and barley for the market of Kermanshah. As for Mahidast itself, it consists of a few dirty streets, unpaved and evil-smelling, and a hundred houses, the greater number of which are in ruins. Its inhabitants are chiefly Kalhur-Kurds, semi-nomads, who migrate in winter with their flocks to the neighbourhood of Khaniquin and Mandali. Mahidast is a great resort of pilgrims on the way {100} to and from Kerbela, and in the main street stands a vast caravanserai built by that industrious architect-ruler, Shah Abbas. I rode inside the great doorway of Shah Abbas' hostelry hoping to find quarters here, but my nose was in revolt at once. A stagnant pool covered with green slime, where myriads of mosquitoes and flies were undergoing a course of field training, occupied the centre of the courtyard, and this was flanked by festering heaps of garbage amongst which lean, hungry-looking dogs were fossicking for an evening meal.