The young nephew of Kulkhan advanced ten paces before the tents to welcome us; and, whilst Ilias and the Afghan were the special guests of Kulkhan, I was quartered with the Hadjis in the small tent of Allah Nazr. [{74}] This old Turkoman was beside himself from joy that heaven had sent him guests; the recollection of that scene will never pass from my mind. In spite of our protestations to the contrary, he killed a goat, the only one which he possessed, to contribute to our entertainment. At a second meal, which we partook with him next day, he found means to procure bread also, an article that had not been seen for weeks in his dwelling. Whilst we attacked the dish of meat, he seated himself opposite to us, and wept, in the exactest sense of the expression, tears of joy. Allah Nazr would not retain any part of the goat he had killed in honour of us. The horns and hoofs, which were burned to ashes, and were to be employed for the galled places on the camels, he gave to Ilias; but the skin, stripped off in one piece, he destined to serve as my water-vessel, and after having well rubbed it with salt, and dried it in the sun, he handed it over to me.
[Persian Slave]
The arrival of a slave, one of the five of whom I spoke in the last chapter, who had fallen into the snare so treacherously laid for them, detained Kulkhan and our party a day. This poor Persian was transferred, for chastisement, to Kulkhan, who had the peculiar reputation of being able most easily to ascertain from a captive whether he possessed sufficient means to enable his relatives to ransom him, or whether, being without relatives or property, he ought to be sent on to Khiva for sale.
The former alternative is much the more agreeable one to the Turkomans, as they may demand any sum they please. The Persian, who is cunning even in his misfortune, always contrives to conceal his real position; he is therefore subjected to much ill-treatment, [{75}] until by the lamentations which he forwards to his home his captors have squeezed from his friends the highest possible ransom, and it is only when that arrives that his torment ceases. The other alternative is worse for both parties; the robber, after much expenditure, only gets at last the current price in the slave-market, and the unfortunate Persian is removed to a distance of some hundreds of miles from his country, which he very rarely sees again. Kulkhan has, as before mentioned, great experience in this department; his latest victim arrived before evening, and the next day the journey was continued, after I had been warmly embraced by Allah Nazr, who was just as much a Turkoman as Kulkhan.
[Commencement of the Desert]
This day I took my seat for the first time in my wooden basket on the camel, having, however, some sacks of flour for my equipoise, as Hadji Bilal wished on this occasion to deprive himself of the pleasure. Our route was always in a northerly direction, and we had scarcely advanced two leagues, when the verdure ceased, and for the first time we found ourselves in the dismal strong-smelling salt ground of the wilderness. What our eyes encountered here was a good specimen; a low foreland called Kara Sengher (black wall) elevated itself at a distance of about eight miles to the north of Gömüshtepe. The nearer we approached this hill, the looser the soil became; near to its foot we fell upon a real morass, and our march was attended by increasing difficulties in the slippery mud, in which the camels, with their spongy feet, slid at each step--indeed, mine threatened to upset both myself and my basket into the dirt. I preferred dismounting proprio motu, and after tramping an hour and a half through the mud, arrived at last at [{76}] Kara Sengher, whence we soon reached the Ova of Kulkhan.
On arriving, I was greatly surprised by Kulkhan's immediately leading me into his tent, and charging me earnestly not to quit it, until he should call me. I began to suspect something wrong, when I heard how he was cursing his women, accusing them of always mislaying the chains, and ordering them to bring them to him immediately. Searching gloomily for them he returned frequently to the tent without addressing a word to me: moreover Hadji Bilal did not show himself--he who so seldom left me to myself. Sunk in the most anxious reflections, I at last heard the rattling sound of fetters approaching, and saw the Persian who had come with us enter the tent dragging with his wounded feet the heavy chains after him; for he was the party on whose account Kulkhan was making these preparations. He was not long in making his appearance. He ordered tea to be prepared, and after we had partaken of it, he directed me to rise, and led me to a tent which had been in the meantime set up; he wished it to be a surprise for me. Such was the object he had in view in his whole conduct. Notwithstanding this, I could never feel any attachment to him, for how great the difference between him and Khandjan clearly appeared from this, that during the ten days I was his guest, this tea was the only repast Kulkhan's hospitality accorded me. I was afterwards informed of his treacherous plans, to which he would most certainly have given effect, had not Kizil Akhond, whom he particularly dreaded, charged him to treat me with every possible respect.
[A Turkoman Wife and Slave]
The tent which I now occupied, in company with ten of my travelling companions, did not belong to Kulkhan, but was the property of another Turkoman who, with his wife--formerly his slave, sprung from the tribe of the Karakalpak--joined our party for Khiva. I learnt that their object in proceeding to Khiva was that this woman, who had been carried off in a surprise by night and brought hither, might ascertain whether her former husband, whom she had left severely wounded, had afterwards perished; who had purchased her children, and where they now were; and--which she was particularly anxious to know--what had become of her daughter, a girl in her twelfth year, whose beauty she described to me with tears in her eyes. The poor woman, by extraordinary fidelity and laboriousness, had so enchained her new master, that he consented to accompany her on her sorrowful journey of enquiry. I was always asking him what he would do if her former husband were forthcoming, but his mind on that point was made up--the law guaranteed him his possession. 'The Nassib (fate),' said he, 'intended to bestow on me Heidgul' (properly Eidgul, 'rose of the festival'), 'and none can withstand Nassib.' There was besides, amongst the other travellers freshly arrived, who were to journey with Ilias, a Dervish named Hadji Siddik, a consummate hypocrite, who went about half naked, and acted as groom to the camels in the desert; it was not until after we had arrived in Bokhara that we learnt that he had sixty ducats sewn up in his rags.