442 A JOURNEY TO LAKE 



on the fide of the room, oppofite to the young men ; and our atten- 

 dants with thofe of the h^afehold occupied the lower parts of the 

 chamber. Some converfation paffed through the medium of our in- 

 terpreter, which turned upon our ufual place of dwelling, and the 

 articles we had brought with us, of which an inventory was handed 

 to the Deba, and after being looked over by him, given to the Wazir, 

 The apartment was built of fods. The roof was flat, made of branches 

 ©f trees laid acrofs, covered with fods, and having a fquare hole near 

 £he centre, which anfwered the double purpofe of letting in light and 

 giving vent to fmoke : the fides of the room were hung with dirty 

 yellow filk. On the right hand of the Wazir were two dogs. The 

 Deba fat at the upper end of the room on a platform of fods two 

 feet high, covered with an old carpet, on a cufhion faced with China fatin 9 

 Before him was a little long table, on which a box, with barley-meal, 

 a blue and white large China tea-cup, a thing, like a fmall lead tea ca« 

 nifter, ufed as a fpitting pot, and a greenifh jafper tea-cup, lefs than the 

 other. This latter was frequently filled by a boy, from a large earth- 

 en tea-pot, with a pale coloured lid, apparently cold. Superftition 

 jn eaftern countries attaches to jafper cups, the property of fplitting, if 

 poifon be put into them ; and this trait at fir ft blufh 5 does not fpeak in 

 .favour of the morality of our Tatar friends. 



Over his head, to defend him from the earth of the fods or other 

 annoyance, were two or three pieces of common chintz, and at the 

 rioht corner was a frnall fquare apartment, made by a chintz curtain, 

 in which was a light; as the Deba lighted his pipe from a chafing difh 

 of charcoal, which was on the floor, I fufpeft him to be a worfhipper 

 of the fun and fire ; and this fufpicion is (lengthened by the long 

 hymns, which our attendants chanted on the road, at the iirft appear- 

 ance of that luminary, 



