CHAPTER II.
We marched from Pír Chhatta at half-past seven next morning. After crossing a few marly banks, snow-white with saline encrustation, we entered a long narrow defile, bounded on the right by high hills of bare rugged rock, and on the left by a low shelf of conglomerate; a few stunted bushes of salvadora, jujube, and mimosa were scattered here and there amongst the rocks, and the surface, everywhere rough and stony, was one mass of marine fossils. At four miles we emerged from this defile into the Míloh Pass, which opens on to the plains a little to the south of where we camped at Pír Chhatta. Where we entered it, the hills diverge, and enclose a wide boulder-strewn basin, through which winds the Míloh rivulet in three or four shallow streams, that reunite at the outlet of the pass.
The Míloh Pass, by us called the “Mooleah Pass,” is so named, I was told by our attendants, on account of the blue colour of the hills. They may look so at a distance, but are anything but blue on close inspection. At all events, the natives call them so, and hence the name; their pronunciation of the Hindustaninilá, “blue,” beingmíloh.
Beyond this basin—every pebble and every rock in which is full of madrepores, ammonites, belemnites, oysters, and other marine fossils—we entered a very narrow and winding gorge between perpendicular walls of bare rock, two or three hundred feet high. Flowing down its pebblypassage is a strong and brisk stream, which is crossed nine times in the transit. From this circumstance the passage is calledNah-langa Tangí, or “the strait with nine crossings.” The water we found very cold, and about sixteen inches deep. On either side, up to a height of nearly six feet, the rocks are streaked with the water-lines of the hot-weather floods. These floods are described as coming down very suddenly after rains upon the hills in the interior: their violence and velocity are irresistible; and the raging torrent carries with it huge boulders, uprooted trees, and cattle caught in its flood.
So sudden are these floods, and often when there are no signs of rain at hand, that natives never camp in the bed of the stream, but always on the shelving banks that are found in different parts of the pass. The Nah-langa Tangí is about three and a half miles long, and conducts into a great basin in the hills. The scenery here is the wildest that can be imagined. The surface is strewed with huge rocks, and traversed by shelving banks of conglomerate and shingle; here and there are thick belts of tamarisk trees, amidst which the Míloh rivulet winds its tortuous course; around rise rugged hills of bare rock, the strata of which are snapped and twisted and contorted in a most violent and irregular manner. At the outlet of the gorge the strata are perpendicular; beyond it, they present every kind of contortion; and in some spots were noticed to form three parts of a circle. In some of the hills, the strata were horizontal, and dipped to the westward at an angle of about forty degrees; in others, but in a hill due west of our camp at Kúhov, the inclination was toward the eastward.
From this basin our path led along some shelving banks of shingle to a small flat called Kúhov. We camped here on some stubble-fields of Indian-corn andsesame, having marched twelve miles. There is no village here, but there are several small strips of corn-fields on the ledges bordering the bed of the rivulet. In a secluded nook amongst the hills close to our camp we found a temporary settlement of Zangíjo Brahoe, dependants of the Mír of Kotra. There were about twenty-four booths, ranged in two parallel rows. They were formed of palm-leaf mats, spread upon a light framework supported on sticks, and had a very flimsy appearance, and certainly provided the minimum amount of shelter. They are here calledkirrí, and the only merit they possess is their portability. Their occupants were extremely poor and dirty, but they appeared healthy and happy, and are certainly hardy. During the cold weather they move about amongst the lower valleys and glens with their cattle and flocks, and in the spring move up for the summer months to the higher tablelands about Calát.
On the line of march we passed a káfila of eighty camels, laden with dates from Panjgúr to Kotra, under charge of a party of Bizanjo Brahoe, most of whom were armed with sword and matchlock. The camels were of a small breed, but very handsome and clean-limbed; some of them were nearly of a white colour. We found no supplies were procurable at Kúhov, not even forage for our cattle. Our conductor, Pír Ján, however, had been roused to a proper sense of his duties by the reprimand he got yesterday, and our requirements were consequently anticipated and provided for beforehand.
Our next stage was sixteen miles to Hatáchi. The path, leading at first south and then south-west, winds along the pebbly bed of the pass, and crosses its stream several timesen route. The rise is very gradual, and the hills approach and diverge alternately, forming asuccession of basins connected together by narrow straits. About half-way we came to a long strip of sprouting corn in the midst of a great belt of tamarisk jangal, which occupies the greater, portion of the pass. This patch of cultivation is called Páni Wánt, “the division of the waters;” and scattered about amidst the fields are a few huts of the Músiyáni Brahoe, dependants of the chief of Zehrí.
Beyond Páni Wánt we passed through a narrow gap between lofty walls of perpendicular rock, in laminated horizontal strata, much fissured and weather-worn, and entered the wide basin of Jáh—that is to say, wide compared with the rest of the pass. Here too there is a good deal of corn cultivation, and along the foot of the hills in sheltered nooks were some small encampments of the Chanál Brahoe.
Amongst the fields are observed solitary little mud huts of neat, and, for these parts, substantial build. They belong to the Hindu grain-dealers of Kotra, who come up here each harvest to select the grain in liquidation of advances made to the cultivators during the cold season. Formerly this land was laid out in rice crops, but this has been put a stop to by the Kotra Mírs, as it interfered with the irrigation of their lands on the plain.
We passed a káfila here of fifty camels laden with dates from Panjgúr to Kotra, under charge of Bizanjo Brahoe. With this káfila, as with the one passed yesterday, were three or four fine young negro lads. The Brahoe were all armed, and clad in thick camlet coats; they wore the national cap, and altogether looked a very independent and hardy set of fellows. Beyond Jáh we passed through a tamarisk jangal, and rose on to a wide shelving bank that stretched up to the foot of the hills on our right. Here we camped at Hatáchi, the largest habitationwe have seen since leaving Kotra. It consists of some twenty-five or thirty mud huts scattered over the surface. The inhabitants are very poor and ill-favoured, and the men especially very dark and ugly. Some of the young women I saw were comely; and I was surprised to see several with undoubted African blood in their veins, to judge from their cast of countenance and frizzly hair.
Our camp was pitched on some small flats covered with the stubble ofjúárcrops, and hard by was a collection of six or sevenkirríor booths belonging to the Khánzai Brahoe. They have adopted this proud title because the Khán of Calát is married to a daughter of their tribal chief. The benefits of the alliance do not seem to extend beyond the empty honour of the title, for a poorer and more miserable set of people we have not yet seen in his territories. The villagers, too, who brought our supplies into camp were in no better plight. Several hideous old women, who carried loads of wood and straw for our camp, were only half clad, and apparently less fed. Poor creatures! theirs is truly a hard lot; they are the mean drudges of the community, are despised by the men, and evilly entreated by the younger and more fortunate members of their own sex. Whilst these wretched people were toiling under their loads, a number of young men, who, judging from outward appearance and circumstances, were little if at all exalted above them in social status, seated themselves about the skirts of our camp and idly viewed the spectacle.
The situation of Hatáchi, in the midst of these rugged and barren hills, may be described as a pretty spot. As we saw it, the place is almost deserted; but in the spring months it is alive with the camps of the migratory Brahoe, moving with their families and flocks up to thehigher plateaux of the Calát tableland. There is a shrine orziárathere, dedicated to the memory of Bahá-ulhacc, the saint of Multán. It is only noteworthy on account of the conspicuous clump of palm and other trees in the dark shades of which it is concealed.
Our next stage was sixteen miles to Narr. For about seven miles the road winds through a wide belt of tamarisk jangal, to the south of which, in a bend of the hills, is the Farzán-ná Bent, or “the cultivation of Farzán.” A few scattered huts of the Hindu grain-dealers of Kotra were seen here and there, but there is no permanent habitation here.
Beyond this we passed through a narrow gorge into the Pír Lákha basin, which we entered near the domed tomb of that name. It was built about a century ago, in the time of the first Nasír Khán, Baloch, and is already in a state of decay. Around it are a number of humble graves, the depository of the remains of departed Brahoe of this part of the country. They are tended by somefaqírs, whose families are housed in very neat and comfortable quarters hard by—to wit, two commodious huts, surrounded by corn-fields, and shaded by some lofty date-palm and jujube trees.
Pír Lákha is about half-way between Hatáchi and Narr, and is approached through a narrow passage between perpendicular walls of rock, that rise in sheer precipices to a height of 150 to 200 feet. I was turning my head first to the right and then to the left, noting that the strata on the one side were horizontal, and on the other vertical, when one of the escort, riding behind me, and from whom, during the march, I had been making inquiries as to the people and country we were passing through, unexpectedly exclaimed, “And there’s the dragon!” “Where?” said I, eagerly, not at the momentquite sure but that some frightful monster was peering at us over a ledge of rock. “There,” said he, pointing to the blank wall of rock on our left, which formed the southern boundary of the passage; “don’t you see it running up the rock?” “No,” I answered, staring full force in the direction indicated; “I see no dragon. What is it like? Is it moving or stationary?” Here my friend, as I could see by the laugh in his eyes, was moved with inward mirth at the not unnatural misunderstanding on my part in taking his words in their literal acceptation. He controlled the expression of his merriment, however, and, with a serious countenance, explained, “I don’t mean alive dragon, sir; God preserve us from him!” Somewhat disappointed, “Then you should have been more precise,” I irresistibly interposed. “But, sir,” said he, in justification, “it is called the ‘dragon of Pír Lákha,’ although it’s only his trail; and there it is, clear as noonday, on the face of the rock.”
And so the dragon resolved itself into the reptile’s trail only, and the trail in turn proved to be merely a vein of white quartz running obliquely across the face of the rock. An inquiry into the history of the dragon naturally followed thisdenouement; and here is my Brahoe informant’s account, much in his own style of narration:—
In olden times, a great red dragon used to haunt this defile. He was the terror of the wicked as well as of the just, for he devoured them alike, such as came in his way, without distinction; and when he could not seize men, he laid in wait and entrapped their sheep, and goats, and cattle. Owing to his insatiable appetite, and his continued depredations, the country was depopulated; and so widespread was the terror of this monster, that wayfarers ceased to travel by this road. At length the holy man whose shrine lies yonder undertook to rid thecountry of this bloodthirsty tyrant’s oppression. Pír Lákha planted histakyaor cell on the spot now occupied by his mausoleum; and so great was the sanctity of his character, and so powerful the protecting influence of God Almighty, that the dragon voluntarily came to pay homage to the saint, and, in place of offering violence, besought his favour with the utmost submission and tender of service.
The Pír made the dragon repeat thekalamaor Prophet’s creed, and converted him to the true faith, toIslám; and giving him his liberty, commanded him not to oppress God’s creatures, and that the Almighty in His mercy would provide for him. And so it was the dragon disappeared, and the country became free, and the saint’s memory perpetuated in the shrine that bears his name. Pír Lákha is the most popular saint of the Brahoe in this part of the country, and his sanctuary is held in the highest reverence by all the tribes around, who constantly resort to it to offer up their prayers and supplications, and to beseech the saint’s blessing, particularly since the catastrophe connected with the dragon’s trail, which, we have just seen, gave such confirming proof of his merits and supernatural powers. It was in this wise: In the early days, when people began to forget the debt of their gratitude to the saint for the great boon conferred by him on them, were careless in the performance of their vows, and neglected to support the servitors of his shrine, they were aroused to a proper sense of their obligations by the reappearance of the dreaded dragon in his former haunts, and with his accustomed violence. The first to feel the weight of his oppression was thetumandár, or “chief of a camp,” of migratory Brahoe who used to winter in the vicinity.
It was in this manner: His favourite wife, who wasyoung, handsome, and well connected, was blessed with no offspring. This was a sore trial to her, and for several years she offered up her petitions at the saint’s shrine as the camp passed it on their way to and return from the summer grazing grounds. At length, making a special pilgrimage to the shrine, she prayed earnestly for the saint’s intercession that it might please God to give her a son, and vowed to give the priest in charge a cow on her prayer being granted. The saint through the priest informed her that her prayer was heard, and, please God, the desire of her heart should be gratified. She went away happy in mind, and in due time was rejoiced by the birth of a son. But, her desire gratified, she forgot her vow, and even failed to offer up her prayers and thank-offerings at the shrine on passing it to the summer pastures, and the like carelessness did she show on the return therefrom in autumn. Next spring, as the camp marched through the gorge on its accustomed journey, the dragon, watching his opportunity, dashed into the midst, seized the boy from its mother’s arms, and disappeared with it over the hills, leaving that white track of its body as a memorial on the rock.
Such in substance was the Brahoe’s story. It explains, at all events, the comfortable circumstances of thefaqírsattached to the service of the mausoleum of Pír Lákha. In such a country, the lot of these people—the priesthood—is really enviable. They are respected and trusted by all classes, they enjoy free grants of land for their support, and receive besides tithes and other offerings; they are not affected by tribal feuds, nor are they obliged to interfere in the politics of the people; and altogether they are the most comfortable and well-to-do of the community. Yet they possess no special merits: generally they are but little better educated than the mass ofthe common people, and are indebted for their good fortune more to hereditary right than anything else.
Beyond Pír Lákha the defile turns sharp to the north, and then bends round to the west and south, where it expands into the little basin of Hassúa. Here we found some small patches of corn cultivation, and a few huts of the Jám Zehrí Brahoe. Here too we met a káfila of sixty camels laden with wool and madder from Calát to Shikárpúr, under charge of Zehrí Brahoe, amongst whom were a couple of African slaves. We also met a small party of Samalári Brahoe driving a few asses and bullocks to Kotra for a supply of grain for their families somewhere in the hills close by. They appeared very poor people, like the rest of the Brahoe we have seen on our journey. What little corn this country produces is bought up at harvest-time by Hindu merchants, and taken down to Kotra, where it is again retailed by them to the peasantry. By this arrangement the tribes are pretty much in the hands of the Hindus, and they in turn of the chiefs.
Beyond Hassúa we passed through a small gap and entered the basin or valley of Narr, and turning off to the left away from the Míloh stream, camped on some open ground at the foot of the hills to the south. There is no village here, though there is a good deal of cultivation in scattered patches. Here and there, too, in the nooks of the hills, we found some small camps of Jám Zehrí Brahoe. They seemed very poor people, possessed of few goats and fewer cattle. Water, fuel, and camel forage are abundant here, but forage for man and horse are unprocurable.
In this march we found no fossils, as in the lower part of the pass; but the hills, though wider apart, are just as bare and inhospitable. The succession of basins orvalleys enclosed by them, however, are more thickly wooded with tamarisk.
At Narr, the Míloh Pass may be said to end in a wide basin, from which narrow valleys lead off to the north and to the west. They bring down the drainage from the hills between Khozdár and Calát The main valley runs northward to Zehrí and Nichára, and down it flows the main stream of the Míloh rivulet.
As we entered the Narr basin from Pír Lákha, a solitary tree standing in the midst of a small patch of young corn on the right of the road was pointed out to us as the scene of the assassination of Sherdil Khán in May 1864. He had usurped the government from the present chief, Khudádád Khán of Calát, and was enabled to hold out against him for some time owing to the defection of Sher Khán, the commandant of Khudádád’s regiment of mercenaries, who with his men joined the pretender. After a while Sher Khán, with the proverbial fickleness of these people, became dissatisfied with his new master, and sought to get restored to the favour of the chief he had deserted. As the best means to this end, as well as by way of repairing the injury he had done the rightful chief, he caused the rebel to be shot by one of his men as they were marching to oppose some of the troops sent against them. Sherdil, on being hit, lost control over his horse, and the startled animal, dashing off across country, threw his rider at the tree mentioned, where he presently died in the arms of a fellow-rebel, Sardár Táj Muhammad Khán. Sher Khán with his mercenaries then returned to his allegiance, and joined Khudádád Khán in his retreat at Kach.
Our next stage was thirteen miles to Gorú. We crossed the Narr basin in a southerly direction over a rough pebbly surface, and at about four miles left it by anarrow winding gorge that opens on to a rough and wild tract between the hills. In the gorge are a few pools of water in the bed of a pebbly channel that conveys the drainage of these hills to the Míloh rivulet; it comes down from the southward along the foot of the hills bounding the valley in that direction; our route diverged from it and followed the skirt of the hills bounding it to the north. At about half-way on this march we passed agaur-band, or “Gabardam,” built across the outlet of a small gully in the side of the hills to our right. It is a very solid and substantial wall of dressed stones, rising from one to two feet above the surface of the ground, and conspicuous from its dark colour contrasting with the lighter hues of the rocks around. Our companions could tell us nothing of its history more than that, like many similar structures in different parts of the country, it belonged to the period when the country was inhabited by pagans. The hills here are very precipitous and wild; their slopes are dotted all over with little black specs, said to be bushes of the juniper, here calledhápurs; the lower ridges are covered with a coarse grass that grows in tufts, and is calledhúwe; it is said to be a very nourishing fodder for cattle.
Our camp at Gorú was pitched on a slaty ridge close to three or four small wells sunk in the gravelly soil. The water is reached at about twelve feet from the surface, and is very good. During the day immense flocks of goats and sheep came to be watered here; they appeared to me to be of a very diminutive breed. They were tended only by a few boys, from which circumstance we concluded there must be some Brahoe camps in the vicinity, though we saw no habitation or sign of cultivation in the whole march from Narr, excepting only a fewbooths of the wandering Lúrí. These people are a kind of gipsy, and are found in all parts of the country in scattered parties of a few families each. They are a distinct race from the Brahoe and Baloch, and are occupied as musicians, potters, rope makers, mat weavers, pedlars, &c. They own no land, never cultivate the soil, and are looked on as outcasts.
The night air of Gorú proved sharp and chill, and towards daylight a hard frost set in. From this we marched eighteen miles to Khozdár, the route mostly westward. At a short distance from our camping-ground we came upon the cultivation of Gorú, and farther on passed the hamlet of the same name, at the foot of the hills to the left of the road. The huts are now empty, their tenants being camped in the nooks of the surrounding hills with their cattle and flocks, for the facility of pasture and water, neither the one nor the other being at this season procurable at Gorú. There is a very extensive cemetery here, whence the place derives its name (gor= grave). The graves are neatly raised tombs built of loose stones, the resting-places of defunct Zehrí Brahoe, who occupy all the hill country round about. At four miles on from Gorú, the road passes over some rough ground, and drops on to the Khozdár valley, the most open piece of country we have seen since leaving the plain of Kach. It bears a very dreary and wintry aspect, and along its northern borders shows no signs of habitation or cultivation or water. In the opposite direction, however, are seen a collection of villages called Zedi, with their gardens and fields, along the course of the little streams draining the southern part of the valley.
At two or three miles from Khozdár, we were met by Major Harrison, Political Agent at the Court of Calát. He came out with a party of forty troopers ofthe Sindh Horse, and conducted us to his camp, pitched close to the fort of Khozdár, where he gave us a most hospitable welcome; whilst the General’s arrival was announced and re-echoed amongst the surrounding hills by a salute of eleven guns fired from a couple of old cannon drawn up outside the fort. The canonneers, of whom there were nearly twenty engaged in the operation, were a wild and dirty-looking set of fellows, with long matted hair, and every sort of dress and undress except uniform.
The little fort is a new structure of mud, only recently completed. It holds a garrison of sixty Brahoe militia, and half a company of regular infantry, and is armed with the two guns above mentioned. It is well situated for the purpose it is meant to serve, viz., to protect the caravan routes centring in this valley through Nal from Kej and Panjgúr on the west, through Wadd from Bela and Sonmiáni on the south, through the Míloh Pass from Kotra, Gandáva, and Shikárpúr on the east, and through Bághwána from Súráb and Calát on the north.
On the plain near the fort are the ruins of two contiguous villages, between which winds a small stream on its way to some corn-fields beyond them. The place has a very dreary look, and the climate at this season is decidedly bleak. The southern portion of the valley is well cultivated and peopled, and during the summer, so we are told, is one sheet of corn-fields. This valley, in fact, with those of Nal, Bághwána, Súráb, and Calát, are the principal corn-growing districts in this country. The elevation of Khozdár is about 3850 feet above the sea, and about 3700 feet above Gandáva on the plain of Kach. The later figure represents the rise in the land between the two places, a distance of ninety-three milesby our route through the Míloh Pass, and gives an ascent of nearly forty feet in the mile.
The Míloh Pass is easy for cattle, is well watered, and has an abundant supply of fuel in the tamarisk jangal throughout its course. Forage for cattle is scarce in winter, but there is a sufficiency of this in summer for caravans and the cattle and flocks of the Brahoe, who find ample space for camping on the shelving banks of the stream, in the succession of basins occupying the course of the pass. Beyond the pass, at Narr, the tamarisk jangal and water supply both cease.
In all our route from Pír Chhatta to Khozdár we observed a series of roadside memorials, emblematic of the national customs of the Brahoe. They are of two kinds, commemorative of very opposite events, and are met with in a very distant ratio of frequency in consequence. The one is calledcháp, and commemorates the weddings amongst the migratory Brahoe. The other is calledcheda, and serves as a memorial of those who die without issue amongst the clans.
Thechápis a perfect circle, described on the ground by a series of stones set together flat in its surface; the centre is marked by a single stone of from one to two feet in length, set upright on end. The diameters of these circles range from ten to thirty feet, and hundreds of them cover every flat piece of ground on the line of road followed by the Brahoe in their annual migrations from the high to the low lands. Some of thechápswe observed were of a different structure from the figure just described. Instead of a single upright stone in the centre, and a circumference marked by stones laid flat, the whole surface of the figure was closely set with stones laid flat on the ground, forming a circular pavement, from the centre of which projected the singlestone set upright. From the circumference of the circle projected a long arm in a straight line running to the north in those we saw. This projection is about thirty feet long, and terminates in a large stone set upright as in the centre; its width is about two feet, and it is formed, like the circle, of stones set close together and flat on the surface of the ground.
Sketch Plan of the Cháp Circles.A. The highroad across a plain.B.Chápcircles of different kinds, as described in the text.C. Amosjidor mosque, marked off on the ground by stones just as are thechápcircles.
Sketch Plan of the Cháp Circles.A. The highroad across a plain.B.Chápcircles of different kinds, as described in the text.C. Amosjidor mosque, marked off on the ground by stones just as are thechápcircles.
Sketch Plan of the Cháp Circles.
A. The highroad across a plain.
B.Chápcircles of different kinds, as described in the text.
C. Amosjidor mosque, marked off on the ground by stones just as are thechápcircles.
These figures, we were told, are made on the actual sites on which have been danced the reels accompanying the festivities that form an important element in the ceremonies attending a Brahoe wedding. The centre stone marks the place of the musician, and the circumference that of the circle of dancers, who pirouette individually and revolve collectively in measured steps, keeping time with the music, to which the while they clap their hands. This clapping of hands is here calledcháp, and hence the name of the figures. Sometimes thesword-dance is substituted for the other, and only differs from it in brandishing naked swords in place of clapping hands. The dance resembles theataurof the Afghans. The sketch onp. 55shows the form of thecháp.
Sketch Plan of the Cheda.A. Highroad round a hill ridge.B.Chedapillars on plain and on rock.C.Chápcircles.
Sketch Plan of the Cheda.A. Highroad round a hill ridge.B.Chedapillars on plain and on rock.C.Chápcircles.
Sketch Plan of the Cheda.
A. Highroad round a hill ridge.
B.Chedapillars on plain and on rock.
C.Chápcircles.
Thechedais a pillar (calledtsalaiin Pushto) of from eight to twelve or more feet high, with a diameter of from three to four or more feet. It is neatly built of loose stones closely set in a cylindrical form. The top is convex or dome-shaped, and from its centre projects a single upright stone. The basement is a small square platform of stones, slightly raised above the surface of the ground. These structures are generally raised on some projecting rock overlooking the road, or on some slight eminence on the plain. At one or two spots we saw four or five close together, but generally they are only met at distant intervals, and singly. In general appearance they resemble miniaturetopesof the kind seen in some parts of Yúsufzai and the Peshawar valley. They are erected to the memory of clansmen who havedied without issue; and it is the custom for the surviving relatives to celebrate the anniversary of such mournful events by donatives to the family priest and a feast to the clan. Where practicable, the customary offerings and ceremonies are performed round the monument itself; and for this purpose their observance is generally deferred to the time when the camps in their annual migrations halt in their vicinity. The sketch onp. 56shows the form of thecheda.
In all our route from Kotra, we saw very few of the people of the country. Including Hatáchi and Gorú with the few camps we passed, the population we found in this tract of country did not exceed two hundred families, if indeed it reached that number. Our companions, however, assured us that the hills were swarming with them, that every nook had its camp, and every valley its patch of cultivation. It may be so, but we saw no signs of any such populousness. In fact, the nature of the country does not admit of any large number being able to support themselves upon it, for the hills yield but the scantiest pasture, whilst the valleys offer a very small surface capable of cultivation. This conclusion is supported by the appearance and circumstances of the people and cattle we did see. They may be described in two words—poor and hungry.
The Brahoe are an interesting people, of whose history little is known. They are true nomads, and wander about the country in their respective limits, with their families and flocks, changing from the high lands to the low according to the seasons and pastures. In this respect they resemble some of the Afghan tribes. Some of them, however, are fixed in villages as cultivators of the soil. They are divided into an infinity of clans, orkhel, such as Mingal, Bizanjo, Zangíjo, Kambarání, Zehrí, Ráisání,Kurdgálí, Rikkí, Samulárí, Hárúní, Nichárí, Rodání, Gurganání, and many others. Their camps are calledtuman, and the head man of eachtumandár.
They differ from the Afghan, Baloch, and Jat of Sindh, by whom they are surrounded, in general physique and physiognomy as well as in language. Their manners and customs, too, are said to differ in many respects from those of the people around them, though, in the matters of robbery and murder, a family resemblance pervades them all.
The Brahoe is of middle height, or below it, and of swarthy complexion; the face is broad, with high cheek-bones, and adorned with beard and mustaches of neither long nor thick growth; the head is covered with a shock of long matted hair, generally jet black; the eyes are black and keen. The body is compactly framed and clean-limbed. Altogether, the race is active, hardy, and enduring. The Brahoe language differs entirely from that of the Afghan, the Baloch, and the Jat, though it contains many Persian and Indian words. The numerals are the same as the Persian, except the first three, which areasit,irat,musit, respectively; but the pronouns are entirely different, and bear no resemblance to those of the other languages; the forms of conjugation and declension, too, are distinct and peculiar. On the march I collected a vocabulary of about eight hundred words, and a few sentences, to show the structure of the language. These, with a skeleton grammar prepared at the same time, will be found in the Appendix. The Brahoes are altogether illiterate. I could hear of no book written in their language, nor could I get a single specimen of their writing.
An amusing incident occurred whilst collecting words for the vocabulary, and it may serve as a suggestiveillustration of the state of society amongst the Brahoes. I asked my Brahoe camel-driver, through the medium of Persian, of which he understood a little, what was his word for arsenic. He appeared somewhat disconcerted, and made no reply, and I inquired whether he had understood my question or not. “Yes,” said he, with a serious look, “I know what you mean. I have heard of it, but have never seen it. It is only known to our chiefs and great men.” “And what,” I asked, “do they say about it?” “People say,” he replied, with grave innocence, “that it is a magic medicine, and that great men keep it as a protection against their enemies.” He had no idea of the manner in which it was used, but he knew from popular report that it was a mysterious medicine which preserved great men from the machinations of their enemies.
We halted a day at Khozdár with our kind hosts, Major Harrison and Dr Bowman, in order to rest our cattle, and on the 18th January marched sixteen miles to Kamál Khán, one of the principal villages in the plain or valley of Bághwána. Major Harrison accompanied us with an escort of Sindh Horse, Dr Bowman remaining with the camp at Khozdár.
Our route was northward, up the pebbly bed of a wide and shallow drainage channel, towards a gap in the hills. The road winds for some miles between low ridges and hills of bare rock by a gradual ascent, and at half-way brought us to the Chikú Kohkauda, or “gap,” a low watershed marking the boundary between the Khozdár and Bághwána valleys. We here found the path somewhat obstructed by the remains of a stone breastwork, built four years ago by the rebel chief Núruddín, Mingal, when he took the field against the Khán of Calát, to contest the possession of the village of Kamál Khán.The breastwork and barricades had been only partially destroyed, and theirdébrishad been left to encumber the road, just as they did at the time the defences were demolished—a characteristic instance of oriental apathy and negligence.
From this point we passed down a gentle slope on to the plain of Bághwána, and crossed a wide extent of cultivated land to the village of Kamál Khán, where we camped near a small stream of clear fresh water, which comes from a spring in the hills two miles off.
Kamál Khán is a good-sized village, or rather, it consists of two villages close together, which contain in all some four hundred houses. Across the plain, at the foot of the hills to the north, are seen some other villages surrounded by leafless trees. The surface is generally cultivated, and divided into little fields, the sides of which are banked up with earth, so as to retain rain-water.
The elevation of this valley is about 4530 feet, as indicated by the aneroid barometer. In summer, when the gardens are in full foliage and the crops are ripening, it must be a pretty place in this waste of hills, and is said to possess an agreeable climate, notwithstanding the bare heat-radiating rocks that encompass it about. At this season, however, it wears a dull, dreary, and bleak look—its winter aspect—and has a raw, cold climate, of which we were made sensible by the prevailing state of the weather, for the sky was overcast with clouds, and a cutting north-east wind penetrated to our very bones. The plain itself appears a bare flat, without either villages or trees, and towards the east presents a great patch snow-white with saline efflorescence.
During the afternoon we received a visit from the chief men of the place. Amongst them were Sardár Mír Muhammad, Mingal of Wadd, a stanch friend and supporterof the Khán of Calát in these times of sedition and revolt by which he is beset. He was accompanied by Abdul Aziz Khán, Náib of Qwetta, and two intelligent-looking young lads, sons respectively of the Sardár of the Sansunni and the Mammassání, or Muhammad Hassani. They were all very plainly clad, and remarkably simple in their manners. About them was none of that ceremony and etiquette, in the observance of which independent orientals are so punctilious; indeed, their bearing was more like that of subjects than of independent chiefs. The two former were old men, with nothing noteworthy about them; but the two lads were remarkably bright-eyed and intelligent youths of eighteen or nineteen years, and so alike, they might have been brothers. Their features were very striking, and different from any we had yet seen; they may be described as a combination of the very widely separated Jewish and negro physiognomy, and reminded me of the Ethiopian figures one sees represented in the Egyptian sculptures.
After our visitors had retired, I heard a voice outside the tent inquiring where theFarangi Hakím, or “European doctor,” was to be found. The man spoke with a harsh and impetuous voice, and I, curious to see him and know his errand, stepped out and announced myself to a wild-looking Brahoe with the scar of a sword straight across the nose and one half of the face. “But,” he replied, making a rapid survey of me, “you are not the man I want. Where is the doctor of Khozdár? Is not he here?” “No, he is not here,” I answered; “we left him at Khozdár.” “Well,” he rejoined, turning brusquely to depart, “I want nothing from you. It was him I came to see.” “Perhaps,” I said, motioning him to stop, “I can do for you what you require of the Khozdár doctor.” “No,” he replied, stepping away with as much haste ashe had come; “I only came to thank him for his kindness to me, and for curing this wound across my face;” and before I could ask another question, the impatient Brahoe was off on his own business.
I now learned from Major Harrison that he was a trooper in the service of the Khán of Calát, and was engaged against the rebels in the battle fought some few months ago near Gorú in the Khad Mastung valley. In the charge against the enemy he received a sword-cut across the face, by which the nose and upper lip were severed, and fell down in front of the mouth, hanging only by a thin shred of the cheek. Recovering from the shock, the trooper at once sheathed his sword, and securing the divided parts as they were with the end of his turban passed across the face and fastened in the folds above, rode straight off the field on the road to Khozdár. After a ride of upwards of seventy miles he arrived at Dr Bowman’s camp, and was at once received under that gentleman’s skilful care. The satisfactory result, and the accident of our journey this way, produced this pleasing instance of Brahoe gratitude and trust in the skill of European doctors. The man, on hearing of the march of our camp from Khozdár, had come in from a distant village to thank his benefactor, and not finding him, hurried away to reach his home before nightfall.
It is a too commonly expressed opinion amongst us in this country that the natives have no sense of gratitude for benefits conferred or for favours received. But this, I am persuaded, is a wrong conclusion; and its injustice is proved by the above-described incident, which is only one of many similar instances that have come to my personal knowledge, and a further reference to which here would be irrelevant to the purpose of this book.
19th January.—From Bághwána we marched twenty-sixmiles to Lákoryán. Leaving Kamál Khán, we followed a small stream over a succession of fields of young corn, just sprouting above the surface, and then, passing some walled pomegranate gardens fringed with willow-trees, entered amongst low hills set close together on either side of an intervening drainage gully. At about three miles we came to the spring-head of the little stream we had followed from camp. The spring issues at the foot of some bare rocky bluffs, and forms a small pool round which grow some eight or ten date-palms, conspicuous as being the only trees in the vicinity.
From this point we turned to the right, and proceeding due north over some very rough ground, dropped into a narrow ravine between high banks of bare rock; and following it some distance, emerged upon the wide plateau or tableland of Loghai, the village of the same name standing away to the west. In the hills to the south-west, near the village of Ferozabad, are the Khappar lead-mines. They are said to give employment to about two hundred men.
There are no trees visible on the Lohgai plateau, nor is there any jangal, but the surface is thinly sprinkled with a very stunted growth of the camel-thorn (Rhazzia stricta,Withiana congulans), two or three kinds of salsola, and a coarse grass growing in tufts. Here and there, too, are some patches of cultivation.
From this we passed through some low rocky ridges on to a similar but more extensive tableland, divided by low ridges of rock into the plateau of Mughali, Tútah, and Záwah. We started from Kamál Khán at 7.50A.M., and arrived at the entrance to the Záwah defile at 10.10A.M., thus, reckoning the pace of our horses at four miles an hour, making the distance about nine and a half miles.
We halted here for breakfast, on the edge of a littlestream of brackish water, whilst the baggage went on ahead. Close by is a ridge of bare rock without a particle of vegetation on it, and along its base are the traces of a very ancient village. The foundation walls are very massive, and built substantially of dressed stone; the surface everywhere around is covered with bits of red pottery.
At 1.10P.M.we mounted our camels, and left Záwah by a narrow winding defile, down which flows the thready rivulet on which we had halted. After proceeding up the defile some distance, we passed over some very rocky ground by a rough track, and rose suddenly to the crest of a ridge of hills running north and south. Descending a little from this, we reach the tableland of Jiwán. This is an open plateau, and, unlike the others, is thickly covered with pasture herbs and bushes, amongst which are interspersed small isolated patches of ploughed land. We saw no villages, however, nor any signs of a camp in the vicinity, though our native escort assured us that there were hundreds oftumanshidden away in the nooks and hollows of the mountains, to which the Brahoe retire at this season, with their flocks, for shelter from the cold winds that blow over the open country.
Traversing this plateau, we crossed a deep ravine, opposite a cavern excavated in its high bank of shingle, and known as Duzdán ná Khond, or “the robber’s retreat.” Here my camel showed signs of fatigue, and became so shaky on his legs, that I became apprehensive of some misfortune, and, to avoid the chance of breaking my neck against the rocks, relieved him of my weight, and mounted my horse, which was being led along close behind us. The severity of the weather and the want of his accustomed forage, combined with the roughness of the roads and our land marches, had told unfavourable upon thepoor brute, and it was as much as he could do to keep up with our party till we reached Kandahar. Here the milder climate and several days’ rest brought him round to his former self, and he afterwards carried me down to Baghdad, where he passed into the possession of the camel’s best friend—an Arab.
Beyond the ravine we crossed a ridge of rocky hills by a very rough and narrow path, and emerged upon the Lákoryán tableland, an enclosed plateau that rises considerably up to the hills on the north and west. We passed a good deal of cultivation on our route across it, and at 4.30P.M.camped—or rather, waited for our camp, for the baggage did not come up till 7.30P.M., by which time it was quite dark—near a spring at the foot of the hills to the north-west. There is no village nor other sign of habitation here, except a small enclosure containing a few roofless huts, a few hundred yards from the spring at which we have taken up our position for the night. We passed a largegaur-bandon the plateau, and at the foot of the hills towards the north-east saw a great collection of them. It was too late for us to go and explore them; but, from what we could see, they appeared to mark the site of some ancient city. The dark lines of their massive walls are very conspicuous against the lighter colours of the hillside.
Whilst waiting the arrival of our tents, we collected some dry bushes of the camel-thorn and some kinds of salsola, and made a fire to warm ourselves, and point out our whereabouts to the baggagers, who were yet some way behind, for to the repeated shouts and calls of our party there came no response.
There are no supplies procurable here, and the water is very limited in quantity, and, though not brackish, of decidedly inferior quality. By previous arrangementsome fuel and fodder had been collected here for our party, but the supply fell very far short of our requirements. The fodder was distributed in small quantities amongst the troopers of our escort, and the fuel—the few faggots there were—was mostly appropriated by our cook. Along the raised banks of some fields near the enclosure above mentioned were six or seven circular vaulted pits excavated in the ground. They are used as storehouses for grain or straw or chaff, and are entered through a small hole at the top. This aperture is only slightly raised above the level of the ground, and is covered by a lid plastered over with mud cement until required to be removed. These grain-pits were examined in the hopes that they might enable us to increase the rations served out to our cattle; but, to our disappointment, they were all found empty, like the country itself.
During the night a steady soaking rain set in; and as it continued in the morning, there was some question as to whether we should be able to proceed on our march. But the point was soon settled when we found the impossibility of procuring any provisions here either for man or beast. So we struck our tents, and at 8.40A.M.set out on our march of twenty miles to Khán Calá of Súráb, and a most trying and disagreeable march it proved. As we left camp, heavy mists hung over the country, and obscured everything from view beyond a couple of hundred yards or so, whilst a thin drenching rain, that presently changed to sleet and then to snow, descended very perseveringly upon us. Fortunately for us, the soil here is a coarse gravel, with only a small admixture of earth, and our cattle consequently got over it without hindrance.
After riding half-an-hour in a north-westerly direction, we turned northwards into a narrow gap in the hills, andbeyond it came to the Anjíra plateau, and at 10.10A.M.halted at asaraenear its north end, for shelter from the rain and for breakfast. In the gap we passed amongst a number of very fine and extensivegaur-band. They are the largest we have seen, and, from their position and appearance, were probably built as defensive works. Two or three of these massive breastworks were on the plain a little in advance of the ridge of hills separating Lákoryán from Anjíra, but most of them were built across gaps between the prominent peaks of the ridge. On the Anjíra side of the ridge, on some level ground to the right of the road, we found a large collection of very substantial walls, of from two to eight feet high. They appeared like the remains of an ancient town. Owing to the inclement weather we did not stop to examine them.
Near thesaraeis a little stream, which carries the drainage of this plateau down to the Míloh rivulet, which it joins somewhere near Narr; and on a turfy bank a few hundred yards off is a solitary hut, with an adjoining walled enclosure. In the latter stands a masonry pillar, about ten feet high, and of recent construction. The monument, our companions informed us, is built on the spot where the corpse of the late Nasír Khán, brother of the present chief of Calát, was washed previous to conveyance for burial in the family sepulchre, he having died here on his way to the capital.
Whilst here, the rain ceased, and the sky cleared for a while, and we got a view of the country around, and a more dreary and inhospitable-looking prospect it would be difficult to find out of Balochistan. To the north, above the lower ridges bounding the plateau in that direction, was seen the snow-topped Harboí mountain, and it was the only feature that relieved the general ruggedness of the bare hills around. The plateau itself,like that of Lákoryán, is covered with saline efflorescence, and supports only a thin growth of pasture herbs. Away to the north-east we spied a few leafless trees around a small hamlet, and by it observed a flock of sheep, tended by a couple of shepherds. Nearer at hand the plain was covered by a wide extent of cemetery, thickly crowded with graves, whilst solitary tombs were here and there scattered over the general surface, and only attracted attention by the shreds of rag floating in the breeze from the poles supported in the pile of loose stones that covered them.
At noon we mounted our horses and proceeded on our way, the clouds again lowering and threatening more rain, by which, indeed, we were very soon overtaken in the form of a storm from the north-west. We had crossed a succession of ridges and gullies, the rocks of which were green, blue, and red-coloured sandstone, amongst masses of lighter hue full of fossil ammonites, oysters, and other marine shells, and emerged on a wide plateau called Khulkná Khad, where we were exposed to the full force of a numbing north wind and blinding drifts of snow.
We made our way across this bleak plateau as best we could, and passeden routea weather-bound káfila of sixty camels, with wool from Núshkí for Karáchí. The camels with their pack-saddles on were let loose to graze on the wormwood, camel-thorn, and saltworts, which here covered the surface more thickly than we had anywhere seen; whilst the drivers, having piled the loads in the form of a circle, and spread felt cloths across from one load to the other, crouched for protection from the weather under the shelter thus afforded. A few of them stepped out to view us as we rode by, and fine manly-looking fellows they were—all Afghans.
Beyond this we crossed a low ridge of hills by a narrowand rough strait, at the entrance to which we noticed a number of perfectchápcircles, and four or fivechedapillars—one of which, to the right of our path, occupied a very conspicuous position on the ledge of a prominent rock—and then entered on the wide and undulating tableland of Azákhel and Súráb, on which are several villages and fruit-gardens, and more cultivation than we have anywhere seen in this country as yet; in fact, we here reached an inhabited region. Our path skirted the hills to the east, and led past a roadside shrine called Lulla Sulemán ná Kher. The head of the tomb is marked by four or five long poles, to which are fastened numberless shreds of cloth, stuck upright in a heap of loose stones, samples of the rocks of the surrounding mountains, and on the top of them lie a number of horns of the wild goat and wild sheep. I stopped to examine these, and amongst the stones found a fine fossil convoluted conch, which I told an attendant trooper I wanted, and he, without hesitation, took it up and brought it into camp, and I subsequently sent it to Peshawar with some horns and other specimens from Kandahar, as I shall have occasion to mention hereafter. I did not see any granite amongst the stones on this shrine, and hence conclude that there is none in the adjacent hills, for the pile is formed by contributions of devotees from all the surrounding country.
Away to the right from Sulemán ná Kher we saw the villages and gardens of Ghijdegán and Dhand, and farther on, passing the collection of hamlets known as Nighár, at 2.45P.M.arrived at Khán Calá of Súráb, where we were very glad to find shelter in a dirty little hut vacated for us, and thaw our frozen limbs. The last six miles of our march were most trying from the intense cold and driving snow, and completely numbedus, so that we could not have held out against it much longer. The north wind is most piercing, and cuts to the very bones. It is calledShomál bád, or “north wind”par excellence, by the natives, and is dreaded as extremely dangerous, often proving fatal by numbing the powers of life. The villagers expressed astonishment at our travelling in such weather, and some of our Khozdár escort chimed in with, “It’s only the Sáhibs who ever think of doing such things; and when they go forward, we must follow them. Surely there is a special providence that presides over their protection.”
In truth, our native attendants suffered severely. The hands, feet, and faces of several of the troopers of our escort of Sindh Horse became swollen, puffy, and painful, but they held out manfully to the end. Not so our Khozdár attendants; they succumbed to the weather even before we had accomplished half the march, and this is the more remarkable, as they were travelling in their own country. They one by one wrapped up their faces in the capacious folds of their turbans so closely that there was barely room for them to use their eyes, and gathering their loose cloaks about them, sat their horses more like bundles of clothes than horsemen. Having thus resigned themselves to their fate, they gradually fell away from our party, and took shelter in the first villages we came to.
We ourselves were not without showing evidences of the effects of the wintry blast. The snow freezing upon our mustaches and beards had stiffened them, so that talking became a painful exertion; we therefore proceeded in silence, with our heads set down against the howling wind and driving snow, and presently dropped away from one another—the General here, Major Harrison there, and I elsewhere—each following his own pace to thevillage ahead of us. My feet were so numbed that on dismounting I did not feel the ground, and consequently nearly fell, and it was some minutes before I could freely use my limbs.
Our baggage did not come up till 7.30P.M., and both men and cattle were much exhausted, but plenty of food and warm shelter soon revived them. Three or four of our baggagers went off with their mules to the nearest villages we came to, and did not rejoin our party till the next morning. With the exception of one muleteer, who deserted with the cloak and fur coat we provided for him, none of our party were much the worse for the exposure.