One story of Sherdil's made the company hilarious. The chief to whom he for a time attached himself--one Dilawur, a native of Jahangia, a village on the Cabul river--heard one day that a wealthy Hindu shopkeeper was to be married. He instantly determined to profit by the bridegroom's happiness. With his men, among whom Sherdil was one, he lay in wait on the bank of the Indus at a place which the Hindu must pass on his way to the bride's house. When the expectant bridegroom came in sight, all bedizened with wristlets and chains and jewels, the brigands, armed with pistol, sword and dagger, fell upon the party, seized the luckless man, dragged him to the river bank, and thrust him into an inflated cow-hide. Then Sherdil mounted upon this monstrous bladder, and paddled it across the river. When the rest were across, the Hindu was carried away into the hills, and Dilawur's scribe--for he could not write himself--penned a letter to his sorrowing friends, informing them that their relative was well and happy, and would be restored to them fat and jolly for the little sum of two hundred rupees. "Wah! wah!" said the company in chorus. "And what next, O lion of the hills?" And Sherdil, whose name means "lion-hearted," chuckled and said-- "Why, did ye ever know a Hindu who would pay a price without bargaining? And the richer they are, the more they haggle. 'Two hundred rupees? No, no: we cannot afford that. The sickness fell on our goats last winter; we are very poor; our friend is very dear to us, but he will be too dear if we pay that price. We will give a hundred rupees, when we are sure our friend has lost no flesh.' But Dilawur Khan has not the patience of a camel. When he got their foolish answer he sent me with another letter, saying that if the two hundred rupees were not in his hands within seven days, he would strike off their dear relative's head and send it them as an offering of peace; only having been at the expense of feeding him with good fattening food all that time, he would require two thousand rupees as recompense." "Wah! wah!" shouted the delighted hearers, to whose sense of justice this appealed no less than to their sense of humour; "and what was the answer?" "Why, the answer was two hundred rupees, full tale, and a present of goats beside. And the Hindu--whom fear and the delay of his marriage had most marvellously thinned--was restored to his home, with good wishes for a long life and many sons--for our sons to pluck likewise." And in the midst of the laughter this story evoked, one of the guests asked a question-- "But why, O Sherdil, hast thou given up the dress of thy forefathers--the chogah, and the blue trousers drawn in at the ankles, and the sandals? Why dost thou wear this strange garb, like the dust of the plain or corn of the fields in colour?" "Eha, that is a strange story too," said Sherdil, and he drew himself up. "I am a servant of the sahib-log."