120 H. G. Raverty —Tibbat three hundred and sixty-five years ago. [No. 2, 
ceed a distance of forty stages, through a part where there are neither 
inhabitants nor cultivation, and where neither firewood nor forage is pro¬ 
curable : only water can be obtained. It is a kohistan (mountainous tract) 
black and arid, but one thing may be said in its favour, and that is, 
that highway robbers are not found in that part. People proceeding 
from Tibbat to Yar-kand, and vice versa , take provisions for forty days 
along with them, such as bread, clarified butter, and flesh. In that 
mountainous solitude there are black crows, so that whenever a horse, 
through fatigue, lies down and falls asleep, these crows come upon the 
animal and peck out its eyes. There are also wolves, that, if they 
chance to find a man alone, they will attack and rend him. These 
crows, too, if they perceive a man through fatigue lying down, several 
of them collect about him and blind him, and after that devour him. 
The route is very rough and difficult, and besides this, an exhalation 
arises from the ground like unto the samum [vul. “ simoon ”]. If a 
person should venture to move along somewhat quickly, this noxious 
vapour or exhalation, reaches his brain, and he becomes affected after 
the manner of people on board ship with sea-sickness. At times people 
die from its effects. Some apply garlic to the head, some smell 
it, sometimes lime-juice is taken, and the person affected recovers ; but 
a great number of horses perish of that samum . 1 2 
“ At times it so happens, that a merchant has ten loads of goods, 
and takes with him twenty horses by way of precaution, to convey the 
goods, and barley, bread, and other necessary stores. By chance, the 
whole of his horses perish on the road [from this malady ?]. The 
merchant then places his loads piled one over the other, in an open 
place, and covers them with mats or felts, and marks the place with a 
heap of stones. If the merchant is going from Tibbat to Yar-kand 
when such an accident befalls him, he comes on, with the persons along 
with him, to Yar-kand, purchases fresh horses, and goes back and 
fetches his property. If, on the other hand, he is going from Yar-kand 
to Tibbat when he has the misfortune to lose his horses, he considers 
which place is the nearest to him, and he proceeds thither, and brings 
on horses to carry the loads. If he should remain away for years, his 
goods sustain neither loss nor injury. 
“ In that mountainous part, there are cattle which they style gilt as 
(yak), the tail of which is bushy like that of the fox, but very long, 
which they fasten to the head of their 'tiiahs 2 or standards, which 
1 This, of course, is dam-girl already described by MIrza Haidar. 
2 The greater the number of yfi.lt tails appended to th e'ti lgh or standard, the 
greater the rank of the leader to whom it belonged. Thus we read in the old writers, 
in the wars between the Christians and the’Usmanli Turks, about Pashas of so many 
