Our baggage did not come up till 7.30 P.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.
CHAPTER III.
Súráb is a populous valley, very fertile, and freely watered by many little streams from the mountains. Its elevation is about 5910 feet at Khán Calá, and consequently its winter is a rigorous season. It now wears a most dreary aspect, but in summer it is said to be bright with corn-fields and gardens in full force. At that season, too, the Azákhel and Khulkná Khad plateaux are covered with the busy camps of the Mingal Brahoe, who are now dispersed amongst the lower hills of Nal and Wadd.
The migratory life led by these people is one more of necessity than of choice it seems; for their hills are so bare, that they produce no timber fit for building purposes, nor forage sufficient for the support of the flocks, whilst much of the soil of the plateaux is so gravelly and impregnated with salines as to be unfit either for cultivation or for building the domed huts so common in Kandahar and many parts of Persia; and, besides, though last mentioned, not the least difficulty is the general scarcity of water everywhere. Since we left the Míloh rivulet at Narr, we have not seen a single stream one could not easily step across dryshod.
Towards midnight the wind subsided, the clouds dispersed, the stars shone out, and a hard frost set in. Fortunately we were all warmly housed in the village, and did not suffer from it; and this is as much as I can say for it on that score. In other respects, our domicile was none of the most agreeable, for though tired and sleepy by the day’s exertion and suffering, it was impossible to get either rest or sleep. The fire, lighted in the centre of our little hut, filled its single unventilated chamber with blinding clouds of suffocating smoke. We no sooner escaped these troubles by lying close on the ground, when our attempts to sleep were at once dissipated by another form of torment, to wit, the fierce attacks of multitudes of the most vicious fleas and other vermin of that sort. They literally swarmed all over the place, and allowed us no rest throughout the night. I could only exist by repeatedly going out and breathing a little fresh air, which at daylight I found to be 23° Fah. It must have been colder during the night, though it did not feel so, probably owing to the subsidence of the wind.
21st January.—Whilst the baggage was being loaded, I examined some faggots of the fuel that had been collected here from the adjacent hills for the use of our camp, and recognised the following plants, with their native names following each, namely:—Juniper (hápurs), ephedra (náróm, the hóm of the Afghans), wild almond (harshín), wild olive (khat, the khoan of the Afghans), wild peach (kotor), and salvadora oleoides? (piplí). The last is said to be poisonous to camels, though not to goats and sheep. On the Anjíra plateau I obtained specimens of the following plants, viz.:—Caper spurge (ritáchk), peganum (kisánkúr), artemisia sp. (khardarno), caroxylon (righit), camel-thorn (shenálo), withiana congulans (panír band), and a species of lycopodion (kásákun).
We set out from Súráb at 10.45 A.M., and proceeded due north over an undulating plateau with hills on either hand. The soil was spongy with efflorescent salines, and the surface was covered with a thick growth of aromatic wormwood. A strong and keen north wind blew against us the whole day. On starting, I went off the road a little to get a couple of blue pigeons I had seen alight on a ploughed field. The cold was so intense, by reason of the wind, that my fingers, although encased in thick woollen gloves, were at once numbed, and I could only carry my gun by shifting it constantly from hand to hand. Presently the pain became very acute, and lasted for more than half-an-hour, whilst I rubbed the hands together to restore the circulation. The poor pigeons must have had a hard time of it battling against the relentless blasts of Boreas; and the fate that transferred them from the bare clods of a wintry wind-scoured field to the warm recesses of a well-seasoned “blaze-pan” (a very excellent kind of travelling stewpan) was, after all, not so cruel a one as it might have been had some hungry hawk forestalled me.
After marching an hour, we passed Hajíka hamlet under the hills to the right; and still continuing over a wide pasture tract, at 1.20 P.M. arrived at Gandaghen Sarae, and camped under the lee of its walls for protection from the wind, our escort finding shelter in its interior. There is a large pool of water here, fed by a sluggish spring oozing from under a ledge of conglomerate rock, only slightly raised above the general level of the country. We found it frozen over. Our escort, after watering their horses here, galloped them about for a quarter of an hour or more, to prevent spasms from the combined effects of wind and water, and not from the fear, as I supposed, of any ill effects from the water itself, which was very brackish.
Gandaghen is thirteen miles from Súráb, and there is neither water, nor tree, nor habitation, nor cultivation on the road between them. Hajíka was the only village we saw, and it lay some miles off the road. The weather was clear and sunny, with a blue sky, but the air was biting cold, and the north wind quite withering. At 9 P.M. the thermometer fell to 16° Fah., and at daylight stood at 10° Fah. At this place two more of our mule-drivers deserted with the warm clothing we had provided for them; they were both Pathans of Kandahar.