LETTER xvii A SEVERE DISAPPOINTMENT 39

this one day !" " For what reason ? " I asked. " Be-
cause he murdered Isfandyar Khan's father, and I hate
him/' I asked him if he liked shooting, and he replied,
" I like shooting men !"

He has done a good deal of fighting, and has been
shot through the lung, arm, and leg, besides getting
sword cuts, and he takes some pride in showing his
wounds. I think he is faithful. Mirza says that he has
smoothed many difficulties, and has put many crooked
things straight, without taking any credit to himself.
His most apparent faults are greed and a sort of selfish
cunning.

There are many camps about the Gal-i-G-av, and
crowds, needing very careful watching, are always about
the tents, wanting to see Feringhi things, most of the
people never having seen a Feringhi. It is a novel sight
in the evenings when long lines of brown sheep in single
file cross the snow-fields, following the shepherds into
camp.

This Gal-i-Gav on the Kuh-i-Kang marks a new
departure on the journey, as well as the establishment of
certain geographical facts. It will be impossible for the
future to place the source of the Karun in the Zard Kuh
range, for we followed the stream up to the Kuh-i-Kang,
or to indulge in the supposition that the mountains which
lie to the north-west are " covered with eternal snow,"
which in'this latitude would imply heights from 17,000
to 20,000 feet.

It is indeed a disappointment that, look where one
may over the great area filled up by huge rock barriers
and vast mountains, from the softer ridges bounding the
fiery Persian plains to the last hills in which the Inner
range descends upon the great alluvial levels of Khuzistan,
not a peak presents itself in the glittering snowy mantle
which I have longed to see. Snow in forlorn patches or