336 Topographical Remarks regarding Afghanistan. 



The houses are formed of a frame-work of wood and sun- 

 dried brick and mud, generally of two stories, and in the 

 form of a quadrangle ; the apartments are open towards 

 the court, being merely closed by sliding panels of wood ; the 

 roofs are flat and carefully surrounded by parapets to prevent 

 the females from being seen ; for the same reason there are 

 seldom if ever openings in the outer wall of the buildings, and 

 the doorway or entrance is never straight, a covered dark 

 passage leading either to the right or left ; in such buildings 

 there can be no ventilation ; every sort of filth is thrown into 

 the streets. The apartments are of no great size, from 

 12 feet in width to 14 or 20 in length, with little or no furniture, 

 chiefly consisting of a mat with a numud or sort of felt cover- 

 ing for the floor, and for the better classes, a Persian or Herat 

 carpet ; and around the room there are numerous small re- 

 cesses in which are placed tea cups, China basons, and tea 

 pots, generally of Russian manufacture ; the rooms are plaster- 

 ed with a fine clay rendered adhesive by being mixed with 

 the down of seeds of a sort of rush ; sometimes the plastered 

 wall is stamped, and whitewash and talc and the whites of 

 eggs give the surface a light shining appearance ; it looks well, 

 and one wonders at the taste displayed. Occasionally the roofs 

 are formed of small carved pieces of wood well joined and tas- 

 tefully arranged, so as to give the appearance of Mosaic to the 

 ceiling, but most frequently small sticks are laid across the 

 beams, over which are mats, and then the mud of the roof. 

 There is generally an inner and outer room only separated by 

 sliding moveable panels. A very few of the better classes 

 have small gardens round their houses, and the court is planted 

 with flowers and fruit trees, with a stream of water running 

 through it. 



All the poorer classes leave Cabul on the approach of winter, 

 and proceed to the milder climate of Jellalabad on account of 

 the expence of firewood and charcoal, and their not being able 

 to lay in provisions for the winter. There are no fire-places in 



