Page:Historyofpersiaf00watsrich.djvu/274

 government spared no effort to convince the Czar of their entire innocence of the slightest participation in the recent occurrences which had terminated so fatally at Tehran. M. Malzoff was able to testify to the same purport, and the British envoy was entreated to request the Minister of his Government at the court of Russia to add his assurances to those of the persons mentioned. In addition to this, it was determined to send an ambassador charged with full powers to offer any reparation that might be demanded by the Czar. But this embassy was looked upon as a service of the greatest danger. The Persians believed that the Czar would very probably exact life for life, and none of them at first cared to act the part of Curtius on the occasion. At length Kosroo Meerza, a son of the crown-prince, was selected for filling the post of the Shah's representative, and he accordingly proceeded to Petersburg. The demands of the Czar were regulated by the exigencies of the situation in which Russia was then placed, rather than by the enormity of the crime which had been committed at Tehran. The imperial armies had sustained reverses on the Danube, and it was feared that Persia, if pushed too