Many of the children, even those in good health, have similar charms fastened to them. I noticed that the Sultana, or her women, fastened one in a gold cylindrical box on the arm of the little Prince Mahomed Omar, soon after he was born. This was to protect him from accident or other evil. Sometimes, for the same purpose, a piece of string only, over which a few prayers have been recited, is tied round the child’s limb. This is done by the poorer people. Against the “Evil Eye”—which, as far as I could understand, is the eye of “envy, hatred, and malice”—something blue is a great protection. Men wear turquoise rings, children and woman turquoise ornaments or blue beads. When a man buys a new horse the servants at once fasten a blue bead or ribbon among the hairs of his tail. It is not necessary for the blue to be seen: it is just as sure a protection when it is hidden. The Evil Eye is a dangerous weapon, so many possess it, and it works silently and secretly. Paralysis, wasting, rickets in children, impotence, and sudden death, the illness of cattle and horses—all these are imputed to the evil eye.
Just outside the house I occupied, after my return from Turkestan to Kabul, there was an open space with a small pond in the middle; this was a favourite playground for the boys of the neighbourhood. I rode through it as usual one morning on my way to the hospital. When I had finished my work and returned home again, my interpreter, who seemed rather upset about something, said to me—
“Sir, I very sorry you kill that boy to-day.”
“What do you mean?” I said; “I’ve not killed any boy.”
“Oh, yes, sir; you remember he called you Feringhi this morning.”
I remembered then that while riding through the playground, one of the boys, a good-looking lad of about twelve, had attracted my attention by calling out something, and he laughed as he ran away. I looked up carelessly and then rode on, thinking no more about it. I said—
“I remember a boy saying something, but I didn’t hear what it was.”
“Sir, he very fool boy to call you Feringhi, but he is dead now.”
“That is very sudden! What did he die of?” I asked.