It Is Considered, By Baluchis, Extremely Unlucky To Give Or Accept An Odd Number Of Coins.

[Illustration: JEBRI]

At Jebri, for the first time, we suffered severely from cold at night, the thermometer dropping to 42 deg. Fahr. just before sunrise. The climate of Baluchistan presents extraordinary varieties, and is extremely trying to Europeans. Although at Kelat the natives suffer considerably more from cold in winter than summer heats, the hot season in the low-lying valleys and on the coast, which lasts from April till October, may be almost said to be the most severe in the world. At Kej, in Mekram, the thermometer sometimes registers 125 deg. Fahr. in the shade as early as April, while the heat in the same district during the "Khurma-Paz," or "Date-ripening," is so intense that the natives themselves dare not venture abroad in the daytime.

Notwithstanding this, even the south of Baluchistan has its cold season. Near Beila, in the month of January, the temperature frequently falls as low as 35 deg. Fahr. in the mornings, rising no higher than 65 deg. at any portion of the day. At Kelat, on the other hand, which stands 6800 feet above sea-level, the extreme maximum heat as yet recorded during the months of July and August is only 103 deg. Fahr., while the extreme minimum during the same months is as low as 48 deg. Fahr. In winter the cold is intense. Pottinger, the traveller, relates that on the 7th of February, 1810, when at Baghivana, five marches from Kelat, his water-skins were frozen into masses of ice, and seven days afterwards, at Kelat, he found the frost so intense that water froze instantly when thrown upon the ground. Bellew, a more recent traveller, in the month of January found the temperature even lower, as when at Rodinjo, thirteen miles south of Kelat, the thermometer at 7 a.m. stood at 14 deg. Fahr., while the next night, at Kelat, it fell to 8 deg. Fahr. The weather was at the time clear, sharp, and cold, the ground frozen hard all day, while snow-wreaths lay in the shelter of the walls. A detailed account of the eight days' journey from Gajjar to Kelat would weary the reader. A description of one village will suffice for all, while the country between these two places is nothing but bare, stony desert, varied by occasional ranges of low rocky hills, and considerable tracts of cultivated land surrounding the villages of Gidar, Sohrab, and Rodingo, at each of which we were well received by the natives. With the exception of a strike among our camel-drivers, which fortunately lasted only a few hours, and a dust-storm encountered a few miles from Sohrab, nothing worthy of mention occurred to break the monotony of the voyage till, on the morning of the _9th of_ April, we sighted the flat-roofed houses, mud ramparts, and towering citadel of the capital of Baluchistan.

[Footnote A: Cossack whips.]

CHAPTER XI.

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