From the Indus to the Tigris

by H. W. Bellew

Soon after the day had broken, and as the rising sun was slanting rays of light upon the country, dimly visible in the departing obscurity, we came upon the wreck of the káfila that had been plundered yesterday. The road was strewed with bits of paper and cardboard boxes, and on either side lay deal boxes smashed to pieces, and tin cases torn open. Our sarbáz hastily ransacked these, and ran along bearing cones of loaf-sugar under their arms and bottles of claret stowed away in their coat fronts. Some got hold of packets of letter-paper, and others of boxes of French bonbons. As we got on, tiring of their loads, they hid them away under roadside bushes, to take them up again on their return.

At about sixteen miles we came to the Turko-Persian boundary, marked by a bare gravelly ridge, slightly more elevated than the others, that form the most characteristic feature of the country. Here the commandant, Murád Ali, with the escort of sarbáz, took leave of us. He produced the paper he showed me yesterday, and asked me to sign it, saying his brother, Karím Khán, with the sixty horsemen, would see us safe into Khánakín. “Then,” said I, “make the paper over to him, and I will sign it there.” He readily assented, and accompanied us to the foot of the slope, and then shaking hands, galloped back to his sarbáz on the crest of the ridge.

We had proceeded about three miles over a gently falling country, thrown into mounds and ridges of bare gravel, and I was in interesting converse with some Bukhára pilgrims on their way to Karbalá, who had joined our party at Casri Shirin, when some signs made by our advanced horsemen from an eminence ahead of our path made Karím Khán mass us all together and push on at a trot. “Has anything been seen?” I asked as we trotted along amidst the dreadful clatter of our mules, who seemed to scent danger instinctively, and quickened their pace with an alacrity I would not have given them credit for. “Yes,” he said, “the enemy are on our flank. Their scouts have been seen.” A little farther on we caught sight of them. “There they are,” said Karím Khán, pointing to a knot of twelve or fourteen horsemen about a mile and a half off, as they passed across a bit of open ground from the shelter of one mound to the concealment of another. “There are only a dozen of them,” I said; “they cannot harm us.” “That’s all you see, but there are four hundred of them behind those knolls. There is a káfila coming out from Khánakín now, and they are lying in ambush for it. We shall not get back to Casri without a fight.”

Farther on we saw another party of these robbers skulking behind the mounds a mile or two off the road to the left. But we had now come in sight of Khánakín. A party of five or six Turkish cavalry with their red caps stood out against the sky on a mound to the right, and a similar party did the same on a mound to the left. A mile or two ahead appeared the green gardens of Khánakín and Hájí Cara, and on the plain outside stood the snow-white tents of a regiment of Turkish infantry.

Karím Khán’s horsemen reined up on some rising ground to the right to await the coming káfila, and the Khán himself, dismounting, said he would here take leave of me. I thanked him for his service, signed his paper, shook hands, and with a “Khudá háfíz!” (“God your protector!”), mounted and proceeded. As we entered Khánakín a large caravan filing out took the road we had come. Some of the camels were beautiful creatures, and perfectly white. Behind them followed a long string of pannier-mules, with their freight of fair Persians, and on either side marched a gay cavalcade of Persian gentlemen. Bringing up the rear was a mixed crowd of more humble travellers, menials, and beggars.

They filed by, and we found ourselves before a great sarae. Here some Turkish officials took possession of us, ushered us within its portals, and informed us the quarantine would last ten days. We were prepared for this delay, although we had cherished the hope that a clean bill of health might pass us through without detention. But the rules were strict, and rigidly observed; we had come from an infected country, and were consequently pronounced unclean, and only the quarantine could cleanse us.

It was very cruel, and a sad disappointment, after our long and wearisome marches to catch a particular steamer, to be here baffled at the very threshold of our success. There was no hope of release. I saw the Basrah packet steaming away in the distance, and myself left on the shore; so resigned myself to the hard logic of facts, and heartily hoped that at least one of the members of that great congress of European medical men who met at Constantinople to devise these traps might some day be caught in this particular snare of his own setting.

Looking around our prison-house, we found three or four parties of wretched, half-starved pilgrims detained here on their way to Karbalá. In their dirt and rags they were the very embodiment of poverty and misery. Turning from them to the quarters at our disposal, the revelation was still more disgusting. The place had not been swept for ages, and the floor was inches deep in filth and stable litter. The torments of the Mydasht Sarae came back vividly to my mind. It was impossible for us to live here, so I asked to see the doctor in charge of the quarantine. “He died of fever ten days ago,” said our janitor, “and his successor has not yet arrived.” I was about to move out of the sarae, and pitch my tent outside, when a Residency khavass, who had been kindly sent forward from Baghdad by the Resident, Colonel C. Herbert, to meet me here and attend me on the journey onwards, made his appearance with a letter from his master. Ilyás, for such was his name—Anglicè Elias—hearing my orders to pitch the tents, here interposed a representation that the heat and dust outside would be unbearable, and sure to make us all ill. If permitted, he would secure us quarters in one of the gardens adjoining. By all means; and away he went on his errand. Presently he returned with a couple of Turkish officials, who heard our objections to the sarae, and at once led us off to a nice garden at a little distance, where we pitched our tents under the shade of some mulberry-trees. A guard of Turkish soldiers was placed round us to prevent communication with the townspeople, except through the appointed quarantine servants, and we were left alone to ourselves.

The Bukhára pilgrims who had joined our party at Casri Shirin, and who had slipped out of the sarae with our baggage, in hopes of sharing the garden and proceeding onwards with us, were discovered by the quarantine people, and marched back to their durance. Poor fellows! they pleaded hard to remain with us, and appealed to me to befriend them; and the quarantine inspector, who, I must record to his credit, did his utmost to make his disagreeable duty as little offensive as possible, promised they should accompany us on our departure hence.

There were three of these Bukhariots. One of them, Hakím Beg, a very intelligent young man of pleasing manners, gave me some interesting information regarding his country. He told me he had set out from Bukhára five months ago with four other friends and two servants. Two of his party and one servant had died on the road through sickness. The other two and the servant were those I saw with him. From Karbalá it was their intention to go to Bombay, and thence home by Peshawar and Kabul.