A Curious Flower, The "Kosisant," Grows Luxuriantly About Here.
It is
in shape something like a huge asparagus, and about two feet high,
being covered from top to bottom with tiny white-and-yellow blossoms,
with a sweet but sickly perfume.
It consists but of one shoot or
stalk, and bursts through the ground apparently with great force,
displacing the soil for several inches.
We left for Gwarjak at 5.30 the following morning. Etiquette compelled
Malak to offer me his horse, while he mounted my camel - an operation
effected with very bad grace by my host. The Baluch saddle consists
simply of two sharp pieces of wood bound together by leathern thongs,
and the exchange was by no means a welcome one so far as I was
concerned. Had it cut me in two, however, I would have borne it, if
only to punish this boorish ruffian for his insolence of yesterday.
Malak's chief failing was evidently vanity, and he was very reluctant,
even for an hour, to cede the place of honour to a European.
The road for the first ten miles or so lay along the dry bed of
a river, which, I ascertained with difficulty from my one-eyed
companion, is named the Mashki. Large holes, from eight to ten feet
deep, had been dug for some distance by the Dhaira natives, forming
natural cisterns or tanks. These were, even now, after a long spell of
dry weather, more than half full, and the water, with which we filled
barrels and flasks, clear, cold, and delicious.
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