There was one case brought to us that afternoon, however, that was quite beyond our skill. A man came with a tale of woe expressed in a mountain dialect that we could not follow; and the bishop had to be impressed as interpreter. He heard, and collapsed in a fit of laughter, gasping out, "He wants a medicine to quiet his wife's tongue, Rabbi." "Tell him I am not a worker of miracles, my lord," said we. The most important subject of local politics that came up for discussion was an attempt recently made by a reforming local governor to take a census of the men of Jilu. A Government official had come among them with papers and ink, and proceeded to write down all their names. When they asked what it was all about, he explained that it was the elections to the _Mejlis-i-Mebussan_, the Turkish Parliament; and that if their names were written down properly they should have a member all to themselves, who should be a man of Jilu, and should live in Constantinople and draw a fine salary, just for sitting in the capital and representing their grievances to the Sultan. The idea seemed a good one, and folk gave in their names freely, till the census was nearly finished. But then it occurred to them that perhaps they had been hasty, and that these lists might be used for other things than the election of an M.P. What if they were a basis for taxation? or even worse, for the drafting of their young men to the army? The result was that a "strong deputation" went after the Government mudir (who, by the way, was an Armenian), confiscated all his papers and burnt them. He was disposed to think that he was fortunate in that he had not been himself thrown on to the pile. A casually minded Government took no notice of the little incident, which after all only concerned an Armenian underling.[102] Had it been a real Turkish official, there would probably have been trouble for every one concerned; and a good many more besides. CHAPTER IX THE DEBATABLE LAND (GAWAR, TERGAWAR, MERGAWAR) Jilu, take it all round, is the most savage bit of primæval chaos in all the "_ashiret_" districts of Kurdistan; yet a short journey beyond it brings us to a district which is in a much more advanced stage of geological development, the strange plain of Gawar. Starting in the morning from one of the glens which lie absolutely under the peaks and crags of Galiashin, our caravan has to traverse one of the grandest, narrowest, and rockiest gorges even in this land of wild ravines--the magnificent gorge of Ishtazin. And yet by the evening, after crossing a range that much resembles our own Sussex downs on a large scale, we are camping on an absolutely level plain of great extent--the "_Gawar_."