There was also a further proof of the work of Ferhad in the shape of a long furrow on a rock, which all the inhabitants believed was made by the Persian’s chisel.
NASIR ALI KHAN, A MUKI OF SARIKOL.
Page 156.
While we enjoyed the wide view from our eyrie and listened to Nadir we became aware that an old man in a flowered coat, snowy turban and slippers, was struggling up the steep track, helped along by two servants. It was the muki, the priest of the Sarikolis, and a man of great importance in the valley, as I grasped when our shikari hastened to meet him and kissed his hands and those of his servants. The old gentleman, panting with his exertions, had come to offer us hospitality and insisted that we should descend and drink tea in his house. We were soon ushered into a little plastered room with an elaborately carved wooden ceiling and seated ourselves at a table covered with a red silk cloth, on which were biscuits, raisins, almonds, and loaf sugar, three or four lumps of which the servants tried to put into the little Russian glasses of tea which they handed us. The principal men of the district squatted on the floor and listened as the muki told my brother how he travelled every two years to India bearing the offerings of the Faithful to the Agha Khan. Our host was very anxious for us to wait while his invisible womenkind prepared a feast in our honour. Though we declined this invitation our visit did good; for two brothers, rich landowners who had long been at enmity with one another, became reconciled that morning when they met to pay their respects to the Consul.
On our return to camp I received the Aksakal’s wife, a Kashgar woman who came gorgeously attired in an embroidered blue silk coat and brought her three children with her. One was a most attractive little girl of five, dressed in a striped silk coat with gold embroidered green velvet cap, under which hung her four black plaits of hair. She enjoyed looking at our illustrated papers, and where children were depicted she pointed them out as being herself or her brothers, according to size. When Sattur gave her tea she was imperative about the quantity of milk and the number of lumps of sugar that she wanted, and I was thankful that she condescended to approve of the strings of coral that I gave her and allowed me to fill her pockets and those of her brothers with fancy biscuits.
The Sarikolis are very fond of music and dancing, and a troupe of youths led by a man who banged the drum in masterly fashion performed for our amusement. A couple played on pipes and the others sang many songs interspersed with dances, one small boy doing most complicated steps and waving his arms gracefully. All had their hands hidden by the sleeves of their thick blue, red, buff, or striped coats, and wore white felt Kirghiz hats with black brims, and either leather or clumsy felt riding boots. They sang with great entrain and some of the tunes were very pleasing, though monotonous, while others had a curious accompaniment of howls—I can describe it in no other way. The performance lasted for hours, and every now and then the troupe divided into two groups which sang alternately to one another something in this style:
First Group: “Your cheeks are like tulips.”
Second Group: “Your eyes are dark as spring-water.”
Only the old people remember the songs of war and fighting; for now the young are not interested in these and only care to listen to themes of love. Iftikhar Ahmad kindly took down for me the words of two of these songs, one of which forms the heading of this chapter. This is the other: