The fakirs, or holy mendicants, are a great institution in the country, as they are indeed throughout the East. They (men, women, and children) profess to do no work, but beg for the day’s requirements. They also profess to take no heed for the morrow, and to make a point of keeping nothing which is given them for the next day, but to expend all they receive from the charitable the same day that they receive it. They may be seen on the sides of the roads and bazars with their wooden or copper begging bowls, suspended by a string round the neck and hanging in front of them, continuously calling out to the passers-by for charity. Winter and summer they sit in the same place all day, but in winter they have a small iron bowl under their posteens, in which a little lighted charcoal is kept in order to keep them warm. The present Amir is much against the mode of life of these people, and he has those boys whom he sees upon the road begging, caught and taken to the workshops, where they are ordered to work, and receive food twice a day and clothes once a year in lieu of pay. They are practically kept prisoners in the workshops, for they are not allowed to go out day or night. So far as benefit to the Government is concerned, they are useless, for they do nothing but play about and idle all day. Coercion has no effect on them, and many of the ustads in the shops who tried to get work out of them, gave them up at last as hopeless, and from what I saw of them, they did nothing but spoil good material when their masters forced them to do anything, and as they did this with even the simplest sort of work, it was easy to see that they hoped by these means to be eventually sent away as useless.