Having exhausted the joke, he was at a loss for something to do, and explained his miserable existence, for he pointed out that as son of Shaikh Ahmad he had more money than he could spend--which was perfectly true--and was bound down to Sulaimania. He sighed for Kirkuk and its big, busy bazaars, and its proximity to Bagdad, which was his first aim, and stood in his eyes the first city of the world. His questions regarding Constantinople were few, and made more from a sense of thoroughness in his queries than a desire for information, and he thought it but a poor place compared even to Mosul. It took a long time to satisfy him as to the reason of my presence in Sulaimania, and I saw he did not believe that I was only remaining a short time, nor that my aim was the commerce in which I was engaged; for to him a merchant was inseparable from his office, and a man who spoke European languages and possessed medicines was obviously there for some other reason. To my immense relief I at last got rid of him. Old Mustafa Beg had himself not anticipated the annoyance that would result from his visit, and was, I could see, very penitent and regretful, for in his own way he was jealous and did not wish others to be free of the house, a futile hope in Sulaimania, where the unmarried man who refuses free permission of entry to all and sundry is regarded as a lunatic, or an excessive evildoer who would conceal the actions that must be necessarily wicked because done behind closed doors. The neighbours’ protests against the visits were not long in coming. The old house-dame had been out at one of their houses and returned with a long complaint from several of them, the gist of which was that if this was the company I preferred I had better go elsewhere to enjoy it, for the advent of a shaikh in a quarter was the forerunner of all evil. Opposite to our house, however, a certain merchant lived, whose wife was one of the ancient family of the Hakkari religious chiefs, and bore the man’s title of “Khan” that indicated her lineage. She was thus related to the shaikhs themselves, and I resolved to appeal to her when occasion should arise. So I kept a look-out for her husband, and when he arrived, called him in. He was a pleasant man, much respected in the quarter, and kept up the tradition of the Kurds that the stranger must be protected. I explained to him the circumstances of the visit, and he promised to send his wife to the shaikh house if the lad came again, and tell them that his presence was not required in the quarter. He lost no time in clearing my character of the blame that had attached to it, and took the most effective means to do so, for as it was sunset, and the women were spreading the bed-clothes behind the “chikha” or mat screens on the roofs, he ascended and announced in a loud voice that Ghulam Husain was more sorry than they at the visit, and had called him to witness his displeasure, and request his assistance in preventing