I got no milk for my supper, and I do not suppose the officer had more than would go into a custard-pudding and a cup of cocoa; but his myrmidons—they knew how to look after themselves, and enjoyed a good time.
[1] In a booklet published by the Church Missionary Society, entitled “Delawar Khan.”
Chapter XXII
Chikki, The Freebooter
The mountains of Tirah—Work as a miller’s labourer—Joins fortune with a thief—A night raid—The value of a disguise—The thief caught—The cattle “lifter”—Murder by proxy—The price of blood—Tribal factions—Becomes chieftain of the tribe—The zenith of power—Characteristics—Precautionary measures—Journey to Chinarak—A remarkable fort—A curious congregation—Punctiliousness in prayers—Changed attitude—Refrains from hostilities—Meets his death.
Between the Khaibar Pass on the north and the Kurram Valley on the south lies a tangled mass of mountains and valleys called Tirah. Here almost inaccessible escarpments, on which the wary goatherd leads his surefooted flock, alternate with delightful little green glens, where rivulets of clear water dance down to the rice-fields, and hamlets nestle among the walnut and plane trees. In one of these villages was a poor country lad called Muhammad Sarwar. His father was too poor to own flocks, and, having no land of his own, Sarwar took work with a miller. It was one of those picturesque little mills which you see in the valleys of the Afridis, where a mountain-stream comes dashing down the side of a hill, and is then trained aside to where the simple building of stones and mud covers in the mill-stones, while two or three mulberry-trees round give such delightful shade that the mill becomes a rendezvous for the idle men and gossips of the village to wile away the hot summer noons.
But Sarwar was of a restless disposition, and the pittance of flour which, together with a kid and a new turban on the feast-days, was all he got for his labours, did not satisfy his ambition. Then there was his friend Abdul Asghar, who, though as poor as himself to start with, now had four kanals of land of his own and a flock of some forty sheep and goats browsing on the mountain-side. It would not do to inquire too closely how Abdul Asghar came by this wealth, but he used to be out a good deal of nights, and he was one of those who was “wanted” at the Border Military Police-station at Thal for his part in several recent cases of highway robbery with violence.
