THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



271 



spitted mutton with a loaf of unleavened 

 bread as table and fork, or satisfy the 

 thirst of the desert with rosy pomegran- 

 ates, luscious apples, or aromatic musk- 

 melons from Chard jui, with almond and 

 raisins to eke out his Oriental meal. 



Let him seat himself beside one of the 

 picturesque, but stagnant, pools, whence 

 Bokhara derives its water, while the 

 shades of evening silently settle about the 

 quiet city. The Emir has tried to pro- 

 tect this Oriental spell by forbidding a 

 hotel within the gates, and the last of the 

 Russian business men have commuted 

 back to their homes in Kagan. But the 

 gates will not be shut for some time yet, 

 so take time now in this most Oriental 

 of cities to feel a little of the philosophy 

 that takes pride in the past and thinks 

 not of the morrow. 



TWILIGHT IN BOKHARA 



Three veiled women come down to the 

 water's edge, their shrouded forms re- 

 flected in sombre tints from the afterglow 

 which leaves its rosy blush in the fringe 

 of sky behind us. Now from behind one 

 heavy veil there emerges a snow-white 

 arm which dots with a touch of light the 

 watery mirror of the quiet pool. In and 

 out flits that firm, slender arm with its 

 heavy gold bracelet until she turns to her 

 companions and they all climb the slippery 

 steps and fade away into the shadows of 

 the roofed bazaar. 



Following her comes the water-bearer 

 with his flabby water skin, which he 

 slowly fills through the neck from a leath- 

 ern bucket until it becomes bloated and 

 full-bodied as some huge amphibian. 

 Some of the water splashes back into the 

 dark pool in a silvery stream edged in 

 pearls. And the music of its falling 

 merges with the musical street cry of the 

 passing peddler of sweets, who is trying 

 to dispose of the rest of his tiny stock be- 

 fore night settles down. 



Here at last is the East. Not Damas- 

 cus, with its tourist hotels and shiny vic- 

 torias ; not Jerusalem, its ancient wall 

 rent by the Kaiser's gate and its glaring 

 clock-tower ; not Cairo, with street-cars 

 clanging by and evil-minded touts dog- 

 ging one's footsteps ; not even Constanti- 

 nople or Delhi or the lovely, but lifeless, 

 dream in marble at Agra, can quite match 



the charm of old-world Bokhara, dusty 

 and tumbledown, with its seared face to- 

 ward the glorious past, when Alerv was 

 queen of the East and Bokhara was her 

 rival. 



Then, as night really falls, we hasten 

 through the deserted bazaars, barred and 

 covered on both sides, where infrequent 

 and dim electric lights can't quite spoil 

 the fanciful effect, past great khans, in 

 whose courtyards solemn, thoughtful 

 camels ponder over problems of their own 

 with supreme lack of concern for the 

 rough stones that bruise knees once ac- 

 customed to soft sand beneath the stars. 

 Here one old patriarch roars like a lion 

 while his turbaned master beats him to 

 his wrinkled, calloused knees. 



And as we emerge from the dilapidated 

 old walls of this dusty mud flower-pot 

 a muezzin up near the scraggly stork's 

 nest that tops the minaret sweetly in- 

 tones the call to prayer. Beside us in the 

 dusty road a string of tawny camels, gro- 

 tesque in their ugliness, but picturesque 

 hulks against the leaden sky, plod silently 

 by on padded feet which sink deep into 

 the soft dust of the Oriental desert. 



THE TOUCH 01" TIME'S LOVING FINGERS 



What costume does for Bokhara, archi- 

 tecture did for Samarkand. The Regis- 

 tan, once the show-place of Central Asia, 

 still retains much of its former beauty, 

 for the tinted tiles which encase the im- 

 posing facades of the mosque schools of 

 Shir-Dar, Tillah Kari, and LTug Beg 

 have retained as much of their Oriental 

 brilliance as is pleasing to the Western 

 eye. Time has touched the tiles of Sa- 

 markand with loving fingers, leaving all 

 that was beautiful and nothing that was 

 garish. 



And the crowds which flock the great 

 market-place today add interest and ani- 

 mation to a historic and dignified plaza. 

 The costume, the facial make-up, the 

 method of transportation and bargaining, 

 all are much what they were when Timur 

 had his capital here, although the me- 

 dressehs, which form three sides of the 

 Registan, are of a much later date, erected 

 while our colonists were settling James- 

 town. 



Outside the native city, with its sellers 

 of melons and menders of shoes, its hun- 



