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8 ADVENTURES IN TIBET.
Khorasan and purged the kingdoms of Ears, Irak, and
Shaum "—the same warrior who, after having crushed the
army of the Seljuk Bayazid I., is said to have shut up the
Turkish Sultan in an iron* cage and exhibited him where-
ever he went as though he were a wild animal. Tamerlane
was on the point of invading China when he died, 17th Feb-
ruary, 1405, at the age of 69, leaving behind him an empire
of immense extent and an imperishable name. Embalmed
with musk and rose-water, and swathed in fine linen, the
body of the world-conqueror was placed in a coffin of ebony,
and deposited under a monolith of nephrite, underneath
the dome of the burial-mosque which he himself had built.
Its magnificent green cupola is visible from the station.
Amongst pious texts of the Koran and his many royal
titles and boastful deeds are to be read in alabaster relief
these words :
" If I were still alive men would tremble."
After the stifling heat of the desert the fresh and luxu-
riant greenery around Samarcand is perfectly delightful.
Seven hundred years ago Sadi, the flower-loving poet of
Shiraz, wrote to his beloved : "If the maiden in Shiraz
held my heart in her hand, I would give her Samarcand
and Bukhara in exchange for the mole on her cheek "
;
meaning that these two cities were the most precious
possessions a man could give to his mistress.
But there goes the station bell ! Good-bye, dreams !
It is time to return to colourless prose. Behind us in the
west we leave Samarcand buried amid its thick orchards,
the greenness of which vies in vividness and purity with
the inlaid tiles of the cupolas ; and behind us, too, we leave
the proud memories of the past.
At length we reach Andijan, the terminus of the railway,
the furthest point to which steam will carry us. There on
the platform awaiting me stands my old faithful servant,
* It really was a sort of palanquin, in which the captive sovereign travelled.
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