Each kochee or bazar in Kabul (streets with or without shops are called bazars) has a kilantar or headman whose duty it is to report to the Kotwal (city magistrate) all births and deaths in his street, keep order among the inhabitants, see that the street is kept clean, and to govern it generally; and he is held responsible for any lawlessness that occurs. Soon after the death of the late Amir there were many robberies in different parts of the city, and all efforts to trace the thieves were unavailing. In some cases a man who shut up his shop and house and spent the night with a friend would return home in the morning to find the whole contents of the shop looted. So many similar cases occurring it was evident that the thieves were well informed of the movements of the householder they intended robbing. In other cases the owners were awakened by the noise made, and in an endeavour to protect their property were wounded or killed by the thieves, and, at last, the inhabitants were in a state of terror, while in the bazars nothing was talked of but the robberies and murders. The Amir was petitioned, and he offered a large reward to any one giving information of the robbers, but without result. Eventually, a shopkeeper who was sleeping, as is usual at night in fine weather, on the roof together with one of his relatives, both with swords on account of the fear prevailing, was awakened by two of the robbers stumbling over him after climbing up to the roof from the outside. He sprang up and raised an outcry, and his relative jumping up too, they made at the robbers with their swords; but the latter, firing their pistols at them, ran off. The shopkeeper, although wounded, ran after them and managed to cut one of the men across the arm with his sword and then seized him, and in the struggle that ensued continued to call for help, until at length some neighbours hurried in and helped him to secure the thief. The relative, however, lay dead, shot through the heart. In the morning the robber was taken to the Kotwal who, by the Amir’s order, applied different tortures in order to make him confess the names of his confederates. Some thirty names were so obtained, and the men were caught and made prisoners, and among them was a kilantar (headman) and one or two Kotwali sepoys (police). The latter, by giving the password of each night to the gang, had enabled them to pass the street guards without question, and made it easy for the robbers to visit any house they desired, and get back to their own houses before daybreak. [Illustration: THE MIHMAN KHANA (GUEST-HOUSE), KABUL.] [Illustration: PORTION OF GARDEN ATTACHED TO MY HOUSE—SAINT’S GRAVE IN THE CORNER OF GARDEN. [_To face p. 48._]