The
Incident Now Seems Trifling Enough, Though It Left A Powerful
Impression Upon My Mind That Night, On The Eve Of Setting Out Through
An Unknown Country, Where The Life Of A European More Or Less Is Of
Little Moment To The Wild Tribes Of The Interior.
The madman was a
dervish, the head-man said, and perfectly harmless as a rule, but
liable to fits of rage at sight of a European and unbeliever.
I was,
therefore, not sorry to hear next morning that this ardent follower
of the Prophet had been securely locked up, and would not be released
till the morrow, when we were well on the road to Beila.
There are, I imagine, few countries practically so little known to
Europeans as the one we were about to traverse. I had, up to the time
of my visit, often wondered that, with India so near, Baluchistan
should have been so long allowed to remain the _terra incognita_
it is. My surprise ceased on arrival at Kelat. It is impossible
to conceive a more monotonous or uninteresting journey, from a
traveller's point of view, than that from the sea to Quetta - a
distance (by my route) of nearly five hundred miles, during which
I passed (with the exception of Kelat and Beila) but half a dozen
villages worthy of the name, and met, outside the villages in
question, a dozen human beings at the most. This is, perhaps, scarcely
to be wondered at. The entire population of the country does not
exceed 450,000, while its area is estimated at something like 140,000
square miles, of which 60,000 are under Persian rule, and the
remaining 80,000 (nominally) under the suzerainty of the Khan of
Kelat.
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