As we were preparing to embark, I had an example of the meanness of native traders, of which I have had before and since many concurring proofs. Our boat had no horses to drag it across, and it was proposed that we should hire them; to which I gave a ready assent, saying, that we should be happy to contribute our share of the expense. The reply was unsatisfactory, since they wished we should bear it all; but this was peremptorily refused, and we embarked without the horses, though the share of each person would not have amounted to a quarter of a rupee, and one of the merchants possessed goods that were valued at 3000 tillas. From terror, they were not so sparing of the name of the Deity, while on the water, as, on land, they had been of their money; but these invocations cost them nothing, and the horses would have reduced their profits. The merchants of this country have none of the liberal notions of the same class of people in Europe; and I am disposed to attribute it to their superintending in person the sale of their goods, and witnessing every outlay which is incurred on their account. We crossed the Oxus in safety, without horses; and I did not regret the opportunity that had presented itself; to show our fellow-voyagers that we were as poor in our purses as in our dress and condition. One individual, a Persian, actually sickened at the thought of crossing the Jihoon without horses, and transferred himself to another boat with oars, where he gave the sailors the bribe of a rupee to row him speedily across. He arrived, with a pale face, to receive our congratulations on his _bravery_; but this individual turned out, in the end, one of our best friends. ~The Oxus.~ We found the stream of the Oxus with a breadth of 650 yards, and in some places 25 and 29 feet deep; so that it was both narrower and deeper than at the point at which we had before crossed it. Its banks were much depressed, and completely overgrown with a rank weed, which chokes the aqueducts. Some fish of an enormous size, weighing from five to six hundred pounds, are procured in this river, a kind of dog-fish, which are used as food by the Uzbeks. Across the Oxus, we found ourselves about six miles distant from the town of Charjooee, which was in sight. For the first time, this noble river was turned to the purposes of navigation, since there is a commercial communication kept up, by means of it, between that place and Orgunje. ~Oxus of Alexander’s historians.~