Barley And Wheat Are Grown By Means Of Irrigation From The Jhow
River, Which In The Wet Season Is Of Considerable Size.
I had expected
to find, at Jhow, some semblance of a town or village, as the Wazir
of Beila had told me that the place contained a population of four or
five hundred, and it is plainly marked on all Government maps.
But I
had yet to learn that a Baluch "town," or even village, of forty or
fifty inhabitants often extends over a tract of country many miles
in extent. The "town" of Jhow, for instance, is spread over a plain
thirty-five miles long by fourteen broad, in little clusters of from
two to six houses. A few tiny patches of green peeping out of the
yellow sand and brushwood, a wreath of grey smoke rising lazily here
and there at long intervals over the plain, a few camels and goats
browsing in the dry, withered herbage by the caravan-track, showed
that there were inhabitants; but we saw no dwellings, and only one
native, a woman, who, at sight of Gerome, who gallantly rode forward
to address her, turned and fled as if she had seen the evil one.
Noundra, which was reached on the 30th of March, was a mere repetition
of Jhow. Neither houses nor natives were visible, though we passed
occasional patches of cultivated ground. About five miles west of this
we left the beaten track and struck out due north for Gwarjak, which,
according to my calculation, lay about seventy miles distant.
[Footnote A: The traveller Masson says that the word _Brahui_ is a
corruption of _Ba-roh-i_, meaning literally, "of the waste."]
[Footnote B: These rings are sometimes so heavy that they are attached
to a band at the top of the head to lessen the weight on the nostril.]
[Footnote C: A town in Western Baluchistan.]
[Footnote D: The word "Mekran" is said to be derived from
"Mahi-Kharan," or "Fish-eaters," which food the inhabitants of this
maritime province subsisted on in Alexander's time, and do still.]
[Footnote E: Russian, "Fool."]
CHAPTER X.
BALUCHISTAN - GWARJAK.
Most European travellers through this desolate land have testified to
the fact that the most commendable trait in the Baluch is his practice
of hospitality, or "zang," as it is called. As among the Arabs, a
guest is held sacred, save by some of the wilder tribes on the Afghan
frontier, who, though they respect a stranger actually under their
roof, will rob and murder him without scruple as soon as he has
departed. The natives of Kanero and Dhaira (the two villages lying
between Noundra and Gwarjak) were, though civil, evidently not best
pleased at our appearance, but the sight of a well-armed escort
prevented any open demonstration of ill feeling.
The first day's work after Noundra was rough, so much so that the
camels could scarcely struggle through the deep sand, or surmount the
steep, pathless ridges of slippery rock that barred our progress every
two or three miles.
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