betrayed information, and the Kervanbashi himself had only escaped with his life owing to the intercession of influential persons. 'After many objections,' said my friends, 'that we could not leave thee here behind in the desert, we have so far prevailed with him that he will take thee with him on the condition that thou wilt, first, permit thyself to be searched to see if thou hast any drawings or wooden pens (lead pencils), as the Frenghis generally have; and secondly that thou promise to take away with thee no secret notes respecting the hills and routes, for in the contrary case thou must remain behind, were we even in the midst of the desert.' I heard all with the greatest patience, and, when they had finished, I played the part of one very angry, turned round to Hadji Salih, and, speaking so loud that the Kervanbashi could not fail to hear, said: 'Hadji, thou sawest me in Teheran and knowest who I am; tell Amandurdi (the name of the chief of our karavan) that it was by no means becoming in him as an honest man to lend ear to a drunken Binamaz (one who does not repeat his prayers) like the Afghan. We must not jest with religion, and he shall never again have an opportunity to assail one in so dangerous a particular; for he shall learn in Khiva to know with whom he has to deal.' The last words uttered with great violence, so as to be heard through the whole karavan, caused my colleagues, particularly the poorer ones, to grow very warm, and had I {93} not restrained them they would have assailed Emir Mehemmed, the malicious Afghan. The person most surprised by this zeal of theirs was the Kervanbashi himself; and I heard how he always contrived to repeat, in answer to the very different representations that were made to him, the same words, 'Khudaïm bilir!' (God knows!) He was an extremely honest, good-humoured man, an Oriental however, disposed, not so much out of malice as fondness for mysteries, to discover in me, any how and at all events, a stranger in disguise; and this, although he allowed himself on the one side to receive instruction from me in many a point of religion, and even in Gömüshtepe had heard that I was acquainted with many books. My artful manoeuvre had, as I have said, diminished my danger; but I still saw to my great regret that the injurious suspicion increased with every step, and that I should have the greatest difficulty in talking even the shortest notes of my journey. I was very much annoyed at not daring to put any questions as to the names of the different stations; for however immense the desert, the nomads inhabiting the various oases have affixed a specific designation to every place, every hill, and every valley, so that if exactly informed I might have marked each place on the map of Central Asia. Cunning has to be employed against cunning, and the scanty notices which I have been able to collect respecting the route is the fruit of an artifice with which I will not weary the reader.