[Sidenote: Fol. 143b.] Fish are had in winter in the Lamghānāt by this curious device:—People dig a pit to the depth of a house, in the bed of a stream, below a fall, line it with stones like a cooking-place, and build up stones round it above, leaving one opening only, under water. Except by this one opening, the fish have no inlet or outlet, but the water finds its way through the stones. This makes a sort of fish-pond from which, when wanted in winter, fish can be taken, 30-40 together. Except at the opening, left where convenient, the sides of the fish-pond are made fast with rice-straw, kept in place by stones. A piece of wicker-work is pulled into the said opening by its edges, gathered together, and into this a second piece, (a tube,) is inserted, fitting it at the mouth but reaching half-way into it only.[864] The fish go through the smaller piece into the larger one, out from which they cannot get. The second narrows towards its inner mouth, its pointed ends being drawn so close that the fish, once entered, cannot [Sidenote: Fol. 144.] turn, but must go on, one by one, into the larger piece. Out of that they cannot return because of the pointed ends of the inner, narrow mouth. The wicker-work fixed and the rice-straw making the pond fast, whatever fish are inside can be taken out;[865] any also which, trying to escape may have gone into the wicker-work, are taken in it, because they have no way out. This method of catching fish we have seen nowhere else.[866] HISTORICAL NARRATIVE RESUMED.[867] (_a. Departure of Muqīm and allotment of lands._) A few days after the taking of Kābul, Muqīm asked leave to set off for Qandahār. As he had come out of the town on terms and conditions, he was allowed to go to his father (Ẕu'n-nūn) and his elder brother (Shāh Beg), with all his various people, his goods and his valuables, safe and sound. Directly he had gone, the Kābul-country was shared out to the Mīrzās and the guest-begs.[868] To Jahāngīr Mīrzā was given Ghaznī with its dependencies and appurtenancies; to Nāṣir Mīrzā, the Nīngnahār _tūmān_, Mandrāwar, Nūr-valley, Kūnār, Nūr-gal (Rock-village?) and Chīghān-sarāī. To some of the begs who had been with us in the guerilla-times and had come to Kābul with us, were given villages, fief-fashion.[869] _Wilāyat_ [Sidenote: Fol. 144b.] itself was not given at all.[870] It was not only then that I looked with more favour on guest-begs and stranger-begs than I did on old servants and Andijānīs; this I have always done whenever the Most High God has shown me His favour; yet it is remarkable that, spite of this, people have blamed me constantly as though I had favoured none but old servants and Andijānīs. There is a proverb, (Turkī) "What will a foe not say? what enters not into dream?" and (Persian) "A town-gate can be shut, a foe's mouth never." (_b. A levy in grain._)