All the larger houses have rooms for the Afghan bath; there is the bath-room proper, and a small dressing-room. It is not a hot dry-air bath like the Turkish bath, but a hot moist air, so that the heat is never so great as in the Turkish bath. The walls are cemented, and the floor either cemented or paved with an inferior marble that is plentiful near Kabul. The cement is made of equal parts of wood-ashes and lime moistened and beaten together for some days. In a recess in one wall is a cistern or tank of stone or cement, with a fireplace beneath it, which is fed from the stokehole outside the bath-room. Public bath-rooms are quite an institution in Afghanistan. They are rented by a bath-man or barber, who makes what he can out of them. Some of the bath-houses belong to the Amîr. The bath is by no means an expensive luxury: the poorer people pay about a halfpenny. Richer people who engage the services of the bath-man or barber to shampoo them, pay about eighteenpence. The plan I adopted was to engage the bath-room and the shampooer for the day. It cost but a few shillings. Having sent word a day or two beforehand, I used to start about ten o’clock in the morning, accompanied by all my Afghan servants, bringing bath-towel, soap and comb. It is the custom in Afghanistan when the master has engaged the bath-room, for the Afghan servant to seize the opportunity of having a free bath. Hindustani servants in Kabul do not presume to accompany the Sahib on such an occasion. The outside appearance of the bath-house is not very inviting. As a rule, there is a large pool of stagnant water near by--the waste water of the bath--and you dismount in a hesitating way. When you get into the small dark unpaved entry, and slip about on the mud, the inclination is to turn round and go out again. However, having got so far, you think you may as well face it out. You find the dressing-room clean and dry, and the bath proprietor (or tenant rather) comes out to receive you. He is dressed--or undressed--ready to shampoo you, his only garment being a waist-cloth. The servants pull off your boots, and help you to get ready, and then fix a waist-cloth, which reaches the knees, very tightly round the waist, fastening it with a particular twist. The bath-man taking your hand, raises the curtain over the arched door of the bath-room, and leads you carefully in. The reason is that the floor being very smooth and wet, you are exceedingly likely, without great care, to have a dangerous fall. When you enter, the air being damp as well as hot, you feel almost suffocated. [Sidenote: The Process of the Bath.]