Baron du Tott, referring to the sharing of bread and salt, says: "The Turks think it the blackest ingratitude to forget the man from whom we have received food, which is signified by the bread and salt."[194] But it is obvious that it is faithlessness to salt, not to bread or ordinary food, that is deemed blackest ingratitude. This is in India, as in Turkey. Tamerlane, the Mongol-Tatar chieftain, speaking, in his institutes, of one Share Behraum, who had deserted his service for the enemy and afterwards returned to his allegiance, says: "At length my salt which he had eaten overwhelmed him with remorse, he again threw himself on my mercy, and humbled himself before me."[195] Frazer quotes a rebel chief in India as saying, when he capitulated after a siege, and was asked if he would return to his old allegiance, "No, I can no more visit my country; I must look for service elsewhere. I can never face the rajah again; for I have eaten Ghoorka salt. I was in trust, and I have not died at my post. We can never return to our country."[196] [194] _Memoirs of the Turks and Tartars_, Part I., p. 214; cited in Bush's _Illustrations of the Holy Scriptures_, at Numbers 18 : 19. [195] Quoted in Burder's _Oriental Customs_, 2d ed., p. 77. [196] Frazer's _Journal of Tour through Himala Mountains_, quoted in Burder, p. 77, at Ezra 4 : 14. Burton says that the Bed'ween of Arabia denounce the Syrians as "abusers of the salt," because they cannot be depended on in their agreements.[197] And Dr. Thomson says that Orientals "often upbraid the civilized Frank because he does not keep bread and salt, is not faithful to the covenant of brotherhood."[198] [197] _Pilgrimage to El Medinah and Meccah_, III., 114. [198] _The Land and the Book_, II., 41. Burton says also, of the Bed'ween of El Hejaz: "'We have eaten salt together' (_nahnu malihin_) is still a bond of friendship: there are, however, some tribes who require to renew the bond every twenty-four hours, as otherwise, to use their own phrase, 'the salt is not in their stomachs.'"[199] And he quotes the advice to him of Shaykh Hamid, concerning the Bed'ween who were to escort him from El Medinah, "never to allow twenty-four hours to elapse without dipping hand in the same dish with them, in order that the party might always be 'malihin,' on terms of salt."[200] Treachery on the part of one who has even partaken of an ordinary meal with another is, however, counted, among Orientals, a peculiar crime, as surprising as it is unusual.[201] [199] _Pilgrimage_, III., 84. [200] _Pilgrimage_, II., 334. [201] Psa. 41 : 9; John 13 : 18.