, according
to the penal code, punished by fine and imprisonment, murder and
adultery by death; but the law is subject to great modifications. In a
word, the Khan is the law, and so long as a man can afford to pay or
bribe him handsomely, he may commit the most heinous offences with
impunity.

Two instances of the way in which justice is carried out happened just
before I arrived at Kelat. In the one, a young Baluch woman was found
by her husband, a soldier, under circumstances which admitted no doubt
of her infidelity. Upon discovery, which took place at night, the
infuriated husband rushed off to the guard-house for his weapon.
During his absence the woman urged her lover, who was well armed, to
meet and slay him in the darkness. Under pretence of so doing the gay
Lothario left his paramour, but, fearful of consequences, made off to
Quetta.

On his return home the husband used no violence, simply handing his
wife over to the guard to be dealt with according to law. Brought
before the Khan the next day, she was lucky enough to find that
monarch in a good temper. Her beauty probably obtained the free pardon
accorded her, and an order that her husband was also to condone her
offence. The latter said not a word, took her quietly home in the
evening, and cut her throat from ear to ear. The Khan, on hearing
of the murder next day, made no remonstrance, nor was the offender
punished. He was an Afghan.

The second case is even more disgraceful. One of the Khan's own suite,
a well-known libertine and drunkard, contracted an alliance with
a young girl of eighteen. He had endeavoured in vain to marry her
younger sister, almost a child, and so beautiful that she was known
for many miles round the city as the "Pearl of Kelat."

Six weeks after marriage this ruffian, in a fit of drunken frenzy
caused by jealousy, almost decapitated his wife with a tulwar, and
afterwards mutilated her body past recognition. The shrieks of the
poor woman having summoned the neighbours, he was seized, bound, and
led before the Khan, who at once sentenced him to death. The execution
was fixed for sunrise the following day. At midnight, however,
a messenger appeared at the gates of the Mir with a canvas bag
containing two thousand rupees. "Tell him he is free," said the ruler
of Kelat. "And if he sends in another thousand, I will _order_ the
younger sister to marry him." The money was paid, and the poor child
handed over to the tender mercies of t