y
accept the proffered kerans with a look of bewilderment, as though quite
unable to comprehend why I should tender them money, and they lay it
carelessly down on the sand while they assist the sowars to resaddle
their horses. To see the indifference with which the magnificent Afghan
nomads toss the silver pieces on the sand, and the eager, covetous
expression that the sight of the same coins lying there inspires in the
three Persians is, of itself, an instructive lesson on the difference
between the two peoples. The sowars become inspired, as if touched by the
magic wand of alchemy, to the discussion of their favorite theme; but the
Afghans pay no more heed to their remarks about money than if they were
talking in an unknown tongue. They really act as though they regarded the
subject of money as something altogether beyond their comprehension.

CHAPTER IX.

AFGHANISTAN.

A few miles across a stretch of gravelly river-bottom, interspersed with
scattering patches of cultivation, brings us to a hamlet of some twenty
mud dwellings. The houses are small, circular structures, unattached, and
each one removed some dozen paces from its neighbor; they are built of
mud with the roof flat, as in Asia Minor. The sun is setting as we reach
this little Harood hamlet, and, as Ghalakua is some three farsakhs
distant, we decide to remain here for the night. We pitch our camp on a
smooth threshing-floor in the centre of the village, and the headman
brings pieces of carpet for me to recline on, together with a sort of a
carpet bolster for a pillow.

The khan impresses upon these simple-minded, out-of-the-world people a
due sense of my importance as the guest of his master, the Ameer of
Seistan, and they skirmish around in the liveliest manner to provide what
creature comforts their meagre resources are equal to. The best they can
provide in the way of eatables is bread and eggs, and muscal, but they
make full amends for the absence of variety by bestowing upon us a
superabundance of what they have, and no slaves of Oriental despot ever
displayed more eager haste to anticipate their ruler's wants than do
these, my first acquaintances among the Afghan tillers of the soil, to
wait upon us. All the evening long no female ventures anywhere near our
alfresco quarters; the rigid exclusion of the female sex in this
conservative Mohammedan territory forbids them making any visible show of
interest in the affairs of men whatsoever. When