Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/333

 ��Even if Tak as a whole did not look antique to me, I feel positive that it did not have a materially different aspect in the days of Alexander, any more than did a dozen towns which I saw later on the line of his march through Transcaspia and Turkistan. I wondered if he, or if Antiochus after him, saw at Tak the same sort of children with heads stained to a faded chocolate color from the henna with which they had been rubbed. I fancy that the women may have veiled their faces

��9-12), and reads as follows in the trans- lation made for me by Dr. Yohannan (compare also the version by Barbier de Meynard, Diet. geog. p. 375, and Marquart, Cntersuchungen, 2. 53-54) : ' Tak was the treasure-house of the ancient kings of Persia. Minuchihr was the first who used it as a treasury. It is an almost inaccessible tunnel in a place in the mountains and is difficult even for one on foot to penetrate. The entrance to the tunnel is like a narrow door, after entering which, one walks for nearly a mile in absolute darkness. It then opens out on a broad site, like a town, surrounded on all sides by lofty mountains which no one can climb on account of their height; or if he did, he could not get down again. In this large opening there are cav- erns and spacious chambers, whose innennost recesses can only partly be reached. In the middle of the place is an abundant spring [i.e. the Foun- tain of Chashmah-i Ali, cf. p. 172, above], which gushes out from a great rock and then sinks down again un- der another rock, about ten cubits away, and no one knows what be- comes of the water. In the time of the ancient kings of Persia two men used to guard the entrance to this tunnel, having with them rope ladders to let down when one of them wished to descend ; but they kept by them everything that was necessary, even

��to last for several years. This state of affairs, with regard to the tunnel and the treasury, continued without change, just as described, until the Arabs came into power. They sought to make the ascent, but were unsuc- cessful, until the time when Maziyar assumed the government of Tabaristan [ninth century a.d.]. He set his eye on this place and encamped before it for a long time, until his hopes to ascend it were fulfilled. One of his men clambered up ; and when he had reached the top, he let down ropes and drew the others up, Maziyar him- self being among the number. In this way he discovered the money, arms, and treasures that were concealed in the caves. He placed all these in charge of some faithful followers be- fore leaving. The place remained in his possession until he was captured [in 838 A.D.]; and the persons who were in charge then either surrendered or died. It is told by Sulaiman ibn Abdallah that there was a place by this Tak, into which if anybody threw anything foul or unclean, great clouds would arise and pour rain down upon it until it was cleansed and purified of the filth. This is well known in that region, and no two inhabitants of the country question the truth of it, so that nothing unclean is left there either in summer or in winter.' [See also p. 174, above.]

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