I had yet another call to make. When I had left Sulaimania I had purchased two bills for two hundred and fifty and one hundred and fifty krans (about eight pounds), upon a Jew of Halabja, and t had been recommended by my friend Matti, the Mosul Christian, to go to one Mansur, a native of Sina of Persian Kurdistan, and a Chaldean. This person was a petty merchant, and agent of a greater than himself in Sina, known as Haji Khanaka. As he was from the native place of Lady Adela, he had from the first installed himself in a lower room of her house, and for years had lived as her guest, paying no rent, owning no furniture, and buying no food, for her kitchen supplied him with his excellent meals. In return for this hospitality he performed certain small duties, as a correspondent to merchants and Chaldeans in Sina with whom Lady Adela had dealings, and procured for her any special stuffs or cloths she might require. He was indistinguishable from a Kurd of Sina, for he wore the short tunic, plaited Persian frock-coat, and a turban wound about a felt skull-cap, which is the costume of Ardalan. He spoke Kurdish, too, absolutely perfectly, and knew Persian quite well. He had already received a letter from Matti regarding myself, and welcomed me to Halabja, putting himself entirely at my service. He lived in a dark lower room, furnished with a couple of carpets and some felts. Upon either side of the far end were the beds, that served their own purpose at night, and during the day were used as couches. They consisted of but a mattress upon the ground, and a roll, composed of pillow and coverlet. Between these beds, exactly at the head of the room, was a large Russian iron box, the mark of the merchant, and above it upon a mud shelf a little heap of devotional books in the Chaldean language. As I entered, Mansur was sitting before the iron box smoking a Persian water pipe, and he rose as I came in, advanced, and with ceremony bowed me to the bed which occupied the highest position, that is, the left-hand far corner of the room as one enters at the opposite end. He lamented the unfortunate times that had fallen upon Turkish dominions, for he had suffered very considerably in pocket from robberies of his goods in transit from Sulaimania and Kirkuk.