The attack is always made either at midnight, when an inhabited settlement, or at sunrise, when a karavan or any hostile troop is its object. This attack of the Turkomans, like that of the Huns and Tartars, is rather to be styled a surprise. They separate themselves {318} into several divisions, and make two, hardly ever three, assaults upon their unsuspecting prey; for, according to a Turkoman proverb, 'Try twice, turn back the third time.' ['Iki deng ütschde döng.'] The party assailed must possess great resolution and firmness to be able to withstand a surprise of this nature; the Persians seldom do so. Very often a Turkoman will not hesitate to attack five or even more Persians, and will succeed in his enterprise. I have been told by the Turkomans, that not unfrequently one of their number will make four or five Persians prisoners. 'Often,' said one of these nomads to me, 'the Persians, struck with a panic, throw away their arms, demand the cords, and bind each other mutually; we have no occasion to dismount, except for the purpose of fastening the last of them.' Not to allude to the defeat of 22,000 Persians by 5,000 Turkomans on a very recent occasion, I can state as an undoubted fact the immense superiority of the sons of the desert over the Iranis. I am inclined to think that it is the terrible historical prestige of the Tartars of the north that robs the boldest Persian of his courage; and yet how dear has a man to pay for his cowardice! He who resists is cut down; the coward who surrenders has his hands bound, and the horseman either takes him up on his saddle (in which case his feet are bound under the horse's belly), or drives him before him: whenever from any cause this is not possible, the wretched man is attached to the tail of the animal, and has for hours and hours--yes, for days and days--to follow the robber to his desert home. Those who are unable to keep up with the horseman generally {319} perish. [Footnote 100] What awaits him in that home the reader already knows. Let me add an anecdote of an occurrence which I myself witnessed. It occurred in Gömüshtepe. An Alaman returned richly laden with captives, horses, asses, oxen, and other movable property. They proceeded to the division of the booty, separating it into as many portions as there had been parties to the act of violence. But besides they left in the centre one separate portion; this was done to make all good, as I afterwards remarked. The robbers went up each in his turn to examine his share. One was satisfied; a second also; the third examined the teeth of the Persian woman who had been allotted to him, and observed that his share was too small, whereupon the chief went to the centre heap and placed a young ass by the side of the poor Persian slave; an estimate was made of the aggregate value of the two creatures, and the robber was contented: this course was often repeated; and although my feelings