After a light breakfast I galloped off to the hospital at daybreak, to escape the intense heat. Having completed my rounds there I returned home about eleven, washed and changed, putting on a dry suit of flannel; then, lying on a couch in the inner room, with all the doors and windows shut to keep out the heat, I munched some of the most delicious fruit--peaches, grapes, and melons--that it has ever been my good fortune to taste. At this time I had not become saturated with malaria, and I could eat fruit without any evil resulting. I slept for an hour, had lunch, and at two o’clock repaired to an underground room, which was comparatively cool, to see the patients, townsfolk, and soldiers who had been gathering in crowds round the house. I continued attending to them till six in the evening and then ceased, whether there were many or few remaining. After dinner I saw the one or two favoured ones who had obtained from the Amîr a special order for me to visit them at their homes. I had at first some little trouble with the Hindustanis. Work was uncongenial to them. Only one of them, my friend the drunkard, had any medical knowledge, even such preliminary attainment as the use of the stethoscope. Of the other two, one I made a compounder, and the other a dresser of wounds. Having one day to amputate a thumb, I desired the dresser to remain at the hospital and administer chloroform. He objected, saying he had finished his work for the day. He did not understand English, but spoke in Hindustani, in which language my Armenian was fluent. I said several things, more or less severe, which my interpreter translated, but the Hindustani went on his way. Had I then been acquainted with Afghan customs I should at once have ordered a soldier to thrash him, but such a procedure would have been unprecedented in a London hospital, and I did not do so. Instead, I wrote to His Highness to enquire if I had authority over the Hindustanis or not. His Highness answered that I had authority over all the Hindustanis and Hakims in the kingdom, with the exception of three men--one Hindustani and the two chief Hakims. He added, that if there were any insubordination I was at liberty to order the offender to be whipped or put in irons. [Sidenote: The Two Chief Hakims.]