DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.15172#0107
CHAP. IV.
FAREWELL LETTERS.
73
course of the river in six days against the stream.
We here had a farewell feast from the Khyrpoor
Ameer and Meer Nusseer Khan the son of the
principal Ameer, who had shown us marked civility
throughout the journey. After the people had
fared sumptuously, our boats were crowded like
sheepfolds. I addressed valedictory letters to both
the Ameers and their chief ministers, besides
several replies to other persons; for the " cacoethes
scribendi" seemed to have beset the nobles of the
land; and I had received, in one day, no less than
six letters. These productions were full of meta-
phor and overstrained expressions of anxiety for
our health and safety, with trite sayings about the
advantages of friendship, and a letter being half
an interview. There is no difference between the
manners of Europe and Asia so striking as in cor-
respondence. The natives of the East commit the
writing and diction of their compositions to a native
secretary, simply telling him to write a letter of
friendship,, congratulation, or whatever may be the
subject, to which he affixes his seal, sometimes
without a perusal. If the signet is not legible,
one may often try in vain to find out his corre-
spondent ; for he never names himself in his letter.
In my epistles, I told the Khyrpoor chief that his
friendship and kindness had brought us without an
accident, and with unprecedented speed, against
the mighty stream of the Indus; and I thought it
as well, for the edification of the Hydrabad Ameer,
to add, that the Indus was a navigable river from
the ocean, and had abundance of water every where !
FAREWELL LETTERS.
73
course of the river in six days against the stream.
We here had a farewell feast from the Khyrpoor
Ameer and Meer Nusseer Khan the son of the
principal Ameer, who had shown us marked civility
throughout the journey. After the people had
fared sumptuously, our boats were crowded like
sheepfolds. I addressed valedictory letters to both
the Ameers and their chief ministers, besides
several replies to other persons; for the " cacoethes
scribendi" seemed to have beset the nobles of the
land; and I had received, in one day, no less than
six letters. These productions were full of meta-
phor and overstrained expressions of anxiety for
our health and safety, with trite sayings about the
advantages of friendship, and a letter being half
an interview. There is no difference between the
manners of Europe and Asia so striking as in cor-
respondence. The natives of the East commit the
writing and diction of their compositions to a native
secretary, simply telling him to write a letter of
friendship,, congratulation, or whatever may be the
subject, to which he affixes his seal, sometimes
without a perusal. If the signet is not legible,
one may often try in vain to find out his corre-
spondent ; for he never names himself in his letter.
In my epistles, I told the Khyrpoor chief that his
friendship and kindness had brought us without an
accident, and with unprecedented speed, against
the mighty stream of the Indus; and I thought it
as well, for the edification of the Hydrabad Ameer,
to add, that the Indus was a navigable river from
the ocean, and had abundance of water every where !