When in Mohammedan cities, they outwardly conform to the tenets taught by the Prophet of the Crescent, but secretly they continue the practice of their own mystic rites. They bury their dead without prayer (after keeping the unembalmed corpse six days), but turn his head to face Kerbela, as do the Mussulmans. They are recognizable from their long moustaches, since the Shiahs are not allowed to have hair so long as to pass the upper lip. Some authorities proclaim them the remnant of the Samaritans who, as related in 2 Kings xvii. 6 and 7, were carried into captivity by Hoshea, King of Assyria; and Rawlinson, in his writings on Persia, speaks of a rock-tomb which they regard as a place of special sanctity. They call it, he says, Dukka-ni-Daoud (David's shop), because they believe that the Jewish monarch was a smith by trade. We stayed two nights in Kirind village. Our quarters were a couple of rooms above a stable which sheltered a sundry collection of goats, sheep, two consumptive donkeys and their charvadars, some stray hens, and two or three pariah dogs. Crossing a dirty courtyard, where filth had accumulated for years, we climbed a broken stairway, and were at home. The flat roof of the stable was our promenade; {87} but, since it was full of holes, which were generally concealed by a thin layer of sun-dried mud, great caution was needed to prevent a sudden and undignified descent into the menagerie below. Our rooms opened on to the roof of the stable. We slept on the floor, and, as it was cold, our Persian servant bought some green wood and made a fire in the only fireplace available, which consisted of a small cavity in the mud floor. A hole in the upper roof supplied ventilation, and served the purposes of a chimney.