MORE TUR HUNTING 199 



wakened in the wee sma' hours by the return of the 

 prodigal, Ah Ghirik, uneaten by a wolf, not drowned, 

 not murdered by a tribesman, clothed, too, in Kenneth's 

 spare Sunday-go-to-meeting tscherkesska. 



He talked in three languages at once, and it was all 

 very disjointed and very funny. The sum-total of his 

 story was that he had been, as Walt Whitman would 

 euphemistically put it, " to the bank of the wood, and 

 become all disguised and naked." 



A roving band of mountain robbers had forcibly 

 taken his clothes, his kinjal, and the wonderful weapon 

 he called " rifle," after which they thrust the forlorn 

 one into a cave to live or die as he best chose. 



It took our servant the best part of the morning to 

 bring his bedraggled appearance up to what he con- 

 sidered proof, and it was not until he had stewed — 

 and in the ubiquitous stock-pot ! — some remnants of 

 beard-moss gathered in the forest and laid by for 

 emergencies, with which decoction he dyed his hands, 

 his beard, and his atom of hair, that he was at ease 

 again. All the other men came to dip their solitary 

 love-locks into the mixture, on the principle, I suppose, 

 of " waste not, want not." They nearly all had 

 shaven heads, with the one spared tuft hanging over 

 the forehead. Here and there we met a Lesghian with a 

 line lot of hair, and such a man, with his aquiline nose, 

 high forehead, and black eyes, looked an Adonis 

 beside his brethren. 



We moved camp back to the timber line, some 

 miles, so that Kenneth, in whom the entomological 

 ardour burns like a raging fire, could do some execution 



