We had scarcely anchored, when a number of natives surrounded the ship.  They made use of very singular vehicles, which resemble round baskets:  these are formed of thick palm leaves, and covered with asphalt.  They are called “guffer;” are six feet in diameter and three feet in height; are very safe, for they never upset, and may be travelled in over the worst roads.  Their invention is very ancient.

I had a letter to the English resident, Major Rawlinson; but as Mr. Holland, the first officer of the ship, offered me the use of his house, I took advantage of this, on account of his being a married man, which Mr. Rawlinson was not.  I found Mrs. Holland a very pretty, amiable woman (a native of Baghdad), who, though only three-and-twenty, had already four children, the eldest of whom was eight years old.

CHAPTER XVIII.  MESOPOTAMIA, BAGHDAD, AND BABYLON.

BAGHDAD—­PRINCIPAL BUILDINGS—­CLIMATE—­ENTERTAINMENT AT THE ENGLISH
RESIDENT’S—­HAREM OF THE PASCHA OF BAGHDAD—­EXCURSION TO THE RUINS
OF CTESIPHON—­THE PERSIAN PRINCE, IL-HANY-ALA-CULY-MIRZA—­EXCURSION
TO THE RUINS OF BABYLON—­DEPARTURR FROM BAGHDAD.

Baghdad, the capital of Assyria, was founded during the reign of the Caliph Abu-Jasar-Almansor.  A century later, in the reign of Haroun-al-Raschid, the best and most enlightened of all the caliphs, the town was at its highest pitch of prosperity; but at the end of another century, it was destroyed by the Turks.  In the sixteenth century it was conquered by the Persians, and continued to be a perpetual source of discord between them and the Turks, although it at length became annexed to the Ottoman Empire.  Nadir Schah again endeavoured to wrest it from the Turks in the eighteenth century.

The present population, of about 60,000 souls, consists of about three-fourths Turks, and the remainder of Jews, Persians, Armenians, and Arabs.  There are only fifty or sixty Europeans living there.

The town is partly situated on both sides of the Tigris, but chiefly on the east.  It is surrounded by fortified walls of brick, with numerous towers at regular intervals; both walls and towers, however, are weak, and even somewhat dangerous, and the cannons upon them are not in good condition.

The first thing that it was necessary for me to provide myself with here, was a large linen wrapper, called isar, a small fez, and a kerchief, which, wound round the fez, forms a little turban; but I did not make use of the thick, stiff mask, made of horse-hair, which covers the face, and under which the wearer is nearly suffocated.  It is impossible to imagine a more inconvenient out-door dress for our sex than the one worn here.  The isar gathers the dust from the ground, and it requires some dexterity to hold it together in such a way as to envelop the whole body.  I pitied the poor women greatly, who were often obliged to carry a child, or some other load, or perhaps even to wash linen in the river.  They never came from this work, except dripping with water.  Even the smallest girls here are clothed in this way whenever they go out.