After so signal a success, the English took some repose for a couple of days. On the second or third day after this disaster, the intelligence having been carried to Mir-cassem, the man seemed broke in two by the middle; he betrayed every mark of grief and affliction, and passed the whole day in the utmost anguish of mind, and in the highest despondency. At night, he sent for Gurghin-qhan, and spent much time in consultation with him. Gurghin-qhan advised him to continue the war; but Mir-cassem, at about four o’clock the next morning, got upon his elephant, and without speaking a word to any one, he returned to Mongher. His troops, on hearing of his departure, followed him corps after corps. Being arrived in the above town, he stopped two or three days, both to get out of the fortress the few effects he had left there, and to review his army; by which last operation he expected to discover how his troops were affected towards his person, and how they stood in their sentiments of obedience and attachment. The review seemed to revive his spirits; and, this being observed by his nearest friends, Aaly-hibrahim-qhan, who had already supplicated him for the release of his English prisoners, now thought this a favourable moment for renewing his intreaties; and he observed how much renown he would acquire by releasing the principal amongst them at least. The nobleman being repulsed, asked that at the least, he might vouchsafe to release the women, which were amongst them, as they might be sent by boats to Major Adams, and after all proved but an incumbrance. The request did not please the Navvab; and he answered, that he ought to say all that to Gurghin-qhan. The latter therefore was applied to, but he answered by asking, in a peevish tone of voice, Where one might now find boats enough for such a multitude? and he paid no further regard to so proper and so honourable a proposal. Mir-cassem, the day before his departure, appointed one Areb-aaly-qhan to command in the castle of Mongher, with two Battalions of Talingas. This was an Arabian from the vilest populace of Bagdad, equally coward and quarrelsome, but, however, who had the merit of being a dependant of Gurghin-qhan’s. After this he marched towards Azim-abad, carrying with him Mr. Hay, Mr. Ellis, and Mr. Lushington, with the other English prisoners. The difficulties and numerous hardships which he was obliged to encounter, on his journey over a country submerged or full of mire, are not to be described, no more than the many misfortunes he met with on his way, especially at the river Rehva. A bridge of boats had been run over it, but still, the horses and other animals being obliged to swim for their passage, were carried away in numbers. Some people preceded the army; and I was of the number, as well as Y8s8f-aaly-qhan, with Mir-shetary, and Mirza-bakyr, and Mirza-abdollah, the two sons of Aga-Mirza. We all joined together, passed the bridge at Reva, and reposed ourselves for one day. The second night, the date of which I cannot remember, a mighty revolution happened suddenly, and an important event took place unexpectedly. Gurghin-qhan was killed; and that ill-fated man, in retribution for his malicious temper of mind, was hastily sent over the stream that divides this world from the other.* This strange event happened in the following manner:—Gurghin-qhan, who was upon ill terms with all the world, but who studied the English in every thing, wanted to carry a high hand over the soldiery; and, in a time of confusion and misfortune, he strove to keep them under that strictness of discipline, which he had seen practised amongst those of that nation. He was not aware that this power of the English over their soldiers, was a gift of Providence, and that those strangers had found the art of turning the particular customs of their country into a second nature in their troops.

“Great will ever be the distance between the pattern and the copy.”

How could the poor Armenian, after having sold cloth by the yard throughout his whole life, pretend, that with an authority of only two days’ standing, he would be able to pass such rules of strict obedience and discipline over a nation, not his own, and which was not yet accustomed to so much regularity and strictness?

“The crow, wholly intent on learning the linnet’s note,

Forgot to look at its own black coat first of all.”

The Navvab having taken post on the banks of the Rehva, where he tarried two or three days, Gurghin-qhan, who con­formably to his custom, always came the last of all, and always encamped by himself, was actually in his tent, when two or three Mogul troopers from amongst those he had disciplined and trained himself, came and asked something about their pay. The General answered in an angry, peevish manner; but the two men, availing themselves of the unprosperous state of affairs, and of the revolution that had taken place, had the daringness to speak with violence. Gurghin-qhan, without attending to the difference of times, screamed out, What? Is there no one there to take these men into confinement? He had hardly uttered these few words, when those men finding themselves alone with him, drew their sabres, and in three or four strokes, stretched him on the ground; and, their horses being just at the door, they got upon them in an instant, and fled through the fields. The servants having immediately raised an outcry, which brought General Marcar, another Armenian, the latter, on descrying the troopers beyond the reach of a musket-ball, fired at them with two or three pieces of cannon that were at hand, loaded with grape; and the report of the cannon being heard by Mir-cassem’s army, which was at a small distance, every one concluded that the English were arrived, and already engaged with Gurghin-qhan. Instantly Mir-cassem had the same thought; instantly he got upon his elephant, and took to the fields. At the same time, a general scream, and now and then some confused cries, coming from Gurghin-qhan’s quarters, struck such a terror into Mir-cassem’s camp, and especially amongst the sutlers and other market-men, that the whole of them, without making the least inquiry, fled on all sides, most of them towards the bridge on the Rehva. The multitude, which was encamped with me on the other side of the river, surprised to see crowds of runaways endlessly pouring upon them, catched their fears and trepidation; and, night coming on, nothing was heard but cries and screams. But as every one was involved in the general confusion, and saw the mob running to and fro, like so many mad men, whilst the great ones ware advanc­ing in haste with burning tapers; such a sight thunderstruk Y8s8f-aaly-qhan, one of our company, who, being as well as Mirza-bakyr, August. full as much frightened as any other, resolved at any rate to inquire into the cause; and then sent people to take some information A. D. 1763. from the runaways. But every one of these giving a different answer, served only to perplex. This diversity augmented our consternation, as there was no getting certain information about the tumult; and some people conceived causes,* which they did not dare to mention, for fear of Mir-cassem’s resentment. All these discordant reports, however, agreed in one point; and this was, in producing some piece of extravagant news, which being spread in a twinkle amongst the runaways, increased their fears, and added to the confusion. Meanwhile, the throng became innumerable at the bridge, and the passage being now dangerous, seemed to retrace an idea of the bridge of Serátt, at the Day of Judgment; for the crowds were now pouring in such numbers on both sides, that the passage became impracticable for people on foot. Elephants and carts cut their ways through the multitudes; and as their treading over the boards of the flooring, forced the boats to strike against each other, the noise bore a likeness to a report of distant firing of cannon. News even came that the English had gained the victory; and as it was thought that the little river only divided the combatants, people prepared their cannon also on this side; and Y8s8f-aaly-qhan, resolved either to pack up his baggage, and get ready at all events, or to run away to some place of shelter. But he was prevented by Mir-shetari and myself, who insisted on some information. At about midnight the uproar commenced subsiding; and I sent a trusty servant, with orders to stop on this side of the bridge; and as soon as he should discover any person of some consequence, to let him pass first, and then only to ask him what was the matter. The man did as he was bid; and, stopping at the bridge, he saw a close paleky making towards it with three or four horsemen attending; the man walked a while with them, and then asked whose lady was in the close paleky? One of the horsemen answered, It is not a lady; it is Gurghin-qhan’s corpse. We carry it to the fields for burial. It is the Navvab’s order.* On this answer, the man returned with this intelligence, and made us all easy; so that we passed the remainder of the night quietly nough. On the morning, Mir-cassem himself passed the river, and encamped on the spot where we were. The next day, he advanced to the town of Bar, where he ordered Djagat-seat-mahtab-ráy, and Radja Ser8p-chund, his brother, to be hacked to pieces.* After that, he marched on, and took up his quarters in Djaafer-qhan’s garden, close to Azim-abad; from whence he sent orders to put the citadel in repair, having appointed Mahmed-amin-qhan, with a fresh body of troops, for its defence.