Nasr-ed Din has been greatly struck by the vast and orderly crowds. His Majesty found, he avers, everywhere a most kindly, good-humored, well - conducted throng, who have excelled all peoples in the art of declaring in a dignified, becoming manner the enthusiasm they felt for their future King and the welcome they generously accorded to their present guest. This, his Majesty has been pleased again and again to remark, is one of the most grati fying sights he has witnessed since he has left nis country, and one he is not likely soon to forget. His Majesty i 9 not, however, without a reflective and philosophical vein of thought. When one of the Persian cour tiers, pointing to the vast crowds lining the streets, observed Bandag&n-i-Aalil "Oh, chief of the servants of the Most High! what an ocean of people, and to think no one knows their names!" the Shah repeated with a pathetic sigh that line of Saadi: — '* Basi jan ba lab amad kih kas bar-o na giryast," which, being interpreted, is—• " Many a soul to lip has leapt (i.e., died). And no man known, and no man wept." His Majesty experiences, he says, special delight in the society of the English aris tocracy. His idea of the "English gentle man " is that he is by nature modest and retiring, dislikes display, and only with great difficulty reveals to a stranger the best side of his character, generally, in deed, as the result of a positive effort. One is always adding, he declares, to the credit side of the Englishman's social and intel lectual account. What most of all, how ever, calls forth his enthusiastic admira tion is the mysterious circumstance that the destinies of a world-wide empire like ours, with its myriads of human beings and endless conflicting interests should be shaped and directed by a few bashful, re tiring individuals attired in plain black clothes, with unlovely top hais, who, were they to trangress any of the criminal laws of their country, would be arrested by a vulgar policeman and put in prison like a common offender.
