History of the Parsis : including their manners, customs, religion and present position : with coloured and other illustrations : in two volumes

66 ATSTORYV OF THE PARSTS. [CHAP. II.

glory in having shed the blood of a “kafir.” At Yezd two Parsis were murdered by some Mahomedans. The criminals were paupers and unable to pay a fine. They were then set at liberty, the judge declaring it'to be unjust to imprison the followers of Mahomed for laying violent hands on mere “ kafirs.” Even so recently as 1874 an act of the most flagrant injustice occurred. A respectable and wealthy Zoroastrian merchant, named Rashid Meherban, was shot and killed in the public bazaar of Yezd by one Rujub Ali, a Mahomedan. After committing the brutal deed the murderer escaped through the assistance afforded him by the sympathismg crowd. The authorities made no effort whatever to trace the culprit and bring him to justice. Owing, however, to the exertions of the murdered man’s relatives who were resident in Bombay, and who spared neither pains nor money to trace the murderer, the criminal was at last discovered in Bushire. The authorities at Shiraz were applied to for the purpose of executing justice, and the governor of that city ordered the accused to be sent for trial to Yezd. There, however, nothing was done to bring the offender before a tribunal. Meanwhile Rashid Meherban’s relatives sent from Bombay several telegrams and memorials to the ministers of the Shah, as well as to the Shah himself, pressing for justice. These sustained efforts led to the authorities at Teheran giving orders to the