6i8 
THROUGH ASIA 
^ Their personal belongings were not many. They con- 
sisted, in the first place, of the clothes they wore, namely 
a chapan or outer coat, a telpek or sheepskin cap with 
the wool on the outside, a belbagh or girdle, in which 
they carried their utensils for making tea. Their lower 
extremities were swathed in long bandages, and their 
feet encased in pieces of sheepskin fastened on with 
cord. Besides their clothes, they possessed a large 
wooden platter {kazang), another of medium size {ayc^), 
and a small one {jam\ a gourd {kapak) for holding 
water, a large ladle or spoon ichumuch), roughly shaped 
out of the root of a poplar, a felt carpet {Jiighiz), and 
a three-stringed guitar {jdvab). But by far the most 
important of^ their belongings was the axe {balta), a 
most useful implement, whether they wanted to make 
a hut, or cut firewood, or clear a path for their flocks 
through the thickets, or in the spring lop off the youncr 
shoots and branches of the trees to feed their sheep 
and goats on. Another indispensable instrument was 
the steel (chakmak) for striking fire ; but once they have 
got^ a fire lighted, they take care not to let it go out 
until they move on to another place. Before driving 
their flocks into the forest to graze, they covered up 
the fire with ashes; and when they came back again 
in the^ evening, they opened out the ashes, placed a few 
dry sticks on the embers, and quickly fanned them into 
a flame. But they also used dried dung for fuel. They 
kept their maize meal in a sack, and placed it and all 
their other belongings on the roof of the hut, to keep 
them safe from the dogs. 
There was first-rate pasturage, they told me, on both 
banks of the river, all the way to the town of Khotan, 
and it grew more plentiful as the town was approached, 
except that in the immediate environs there were no 
pastures ; so that the bais who owned sheep kept them 
all the year round in the forests that fringe both banks 
of the Khotan-daria. In the seasons during which the 
river was dry, people always travelled along the bed of 
the stream, which was as hard and dry as a street ; and 
