1841] Roree in Khypoor. 493 



were pounded and mixed with the meat and some ghee added after it 

 was removed from the fire. 



Another dish consisted of rice served in the water in which it was 

 boiled, and seasoned with salt, ghee, and lime juice. 



A third dish, called I think Ruhta, was made of white pumkin cut in 

 small slices, parboiled, and thrown into about eighty pounds of duhee or 

 coagulated milk, and served with cayenne pepper, salt, onions, and garlic. 

 Every one was helped to a small cup of ruhta. The rice was thrown 

 into large earthen platters each capacious enough to allow eight or nine 

 persons to sit round it, and the meat was heaped on the rice and a little 

 ruhta poured over it. The Company dined in the open air and were 

 much scattered. Some sat on mats and blankets they brought with 

 them, and the greatest number on the bare earth. It would have been 

 prononnced a shabby banquet in India. According to a Sindian 

 custom, each groupe before they drew to the platters, looked cautiously 

 round, to ascertain if an enemy not bidden to the feast, was watching them. 

 They devoured the meat in unseemly haste and it was over in about 

 an hour. 



The Belooch, Puthans, Moghuls, and other northern tribes, settled in 

 Sind, are tall and well made, and the upper classes have dark brilliant 

 eyes and expressive features. They as much surpass the inhabitants of 

 Oude and the Delhi Territory in bulk and stature, as the latter do the 

 tribes of Bombay, Bengal and the Konkan. In complexion, they are 

 fairer than the Bengalees but less so than the Moosulmans of Northern 

 India. They let their beards grow to a great length regarding a well 

 covered chin as a handsome and becoming ornament of the face. Asiatic 

 monarchs, like the early French Kings (the Franks,) never allow the 

 scissors to touch their beards, and regard the beard as a mark of freedom 

 and illustrious birth, and cultivate and prize it exceedingly. The 

 Belooch also permit the hair of their heads to grow in wild profusion 

 which I need not observe, is expressly prohibited by the Koran, for a 

 Moosulman is enjoined to leave only a small tuff of hair on the crown 

 of the head to afford Moohummud a hold in lifting him to Paradise. 



The beards of the Belooch, like those of other Asiatic faces, are mostly 

 black and the practice of staining them as they turn grey, is almost 

 universal. An extract from the leaves of hina (lawsonia inermis) and 

 indigo are used for the purpose, and if not renewed at proper intervals, 

 changes the beard of a fierry red or deep orange colour. It is much the 

 custom, among the Persians and Afghans, and they assist the operation 

 by the vapour bath. 



