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 native mountains the Looristan and Bakhtiari chiefs in his camp, knowing that they would in all probability raise disturbances after his decease. At a lonely spot in the pass of Kerrind, marked by the remnant of an ancient arch, died the eldest son of Fetteh Ali Shah, at the early age of thirty-seven, and his removal from the scene probably saved his country, at a later period, from a renewal of the horrors of civil war, to which, in the preceding century, she had for so long a time been given over. When the news of this occurrence reached Tehran, it was, according to Persian custom, at first concealed from the king. Gradually his ministers and nobles assumed the garments of mourning, and it was not until after the lapse of a week that the news of his son's demise was revealed to the Shah from the lips of his youngest child.

In the meantime, the war continued to rage upon the frontier of Azerbaeejan. The Porte appointed a new Seraskier to Erzeroum, and under him were three Pashas, each of whom took the field at the head of a separate force. Of these, one undertook the siege of toprak-Killeh, while the other two marched towards the Persian frontier, with the intention of invading Azerbaeejan. A Persian officer starting from Erivan encountered a Turkish force, which he defeated, taking its commander, and a thousand men, prisoners. These were sent to the Crown-Prince of Persia at Khoi, and as he was anxious for a termination of the hostilities that were being carried on, he despatched them all free from ransom to the Pasha of Erzeroum, with an expression of his desire to see peace re-established. But the Seraskier, in Persian phrase, imagined that he could