254 By Mountain, Lake, and Plain 



dwellings, and when decorated with rugs and 

 hangings of the rare and beautiful carpet -work 

 of the country, glowing with colour, and hung 

 about with guns and swords, their interiors have 

 a thoroughly oriental picturesqueness. 



The appearance of these Turkoman barbarians is 

 certainly not such as to give the lie to the char- 

 acter they bear for cruelty of all kinds. A Yamut 

 is tall and bony, with high cheek-bones, hairless 

 face, and sallow skin, giving an impression of a 

 human vulture. The women are as unattractive 

 as the men, though the children, in skull-caps 

 ornamented with silver, as is usual among the 

 plainest breeds of beasts and men, are not devoid 

 of prettiness. It is indeed extraordinary, con- 

 sidering the centuries during which the Turkoman 

 have been in the habit of stealing their brides 

 and slaves from Persia, how the original type 

 has been preserved. The Goklan, whose country 

 marches with the Yamut, are of apparently better 

 physique, with ruddier complexions and black 

 beards ; and having a smaller admixture of the 

 Mongol strain, are more prepossessing than their 

 neighbours. Their reputation for savagery, how- 

 ever, is no better rather worse, in fact than 

 that of their kinsmen ; and villages burnt and 

 lands laid waste, even up to the very walls of 

 the Persian town of Astrabad, made one realise 



