254 EN ROUTE FOR DAGHESTAN. 



and his taste for strong drink only strengthened 

 by occasional enforced abstinence. 



After another ablution the meats were cleared 

 away and pipes produced, when, to my horror, I 

 found I had lost my tobacco pouch. How- 

 ever, lots of tobacco was soon forthcoming, and 

 next morning a prettily knit purse for the fra- 

 grant weed, worked in purple and gold by the 

 nimble fingers of one of the invisible daughters 

 of the house, was presented to me. Anything 

 more luxurious than a lounge on the cushion- 

 covered carpets of Gerdaoul, with a ruddy hearth 

 fire by your side, the good native wine to drink, 

 and the best of tobacco to smoke, with a crowd 

 of picturesquely wild fellows around you, and a 

 distant view of the mountains through the open 

 doorway, it has seldom been my lot to enjoy, 

 and it was far into the night before I could 

 make up my mind to leave it all for the realms of 

 sleep. 



