The Shah's new road
soon brought along a far more engagingjVi/iw, with all sorts'of
geometric fancies woven on its stripes. Another series of
negotiations started.
If I had paid ten shillings for the plainer one, how much more
must I not give for this superior specimen, said they.
If I had paid too much for one, how much the more reason
for not doing so with another also, said I.
The lady who had woven it, a merry black-eyed bride, was
not anxious to sell, said she. The jajim had taken her a long
time to make; its wools were spun, its colours dyed, and its
pattern invented, all by herself.
True, said I, and I would not wish to deprive her of anything
so valued: but why should I get another jajim when I had one
already, except as an unnecessary extra if the price were truly
reasonable? and I handed it back to her for the night, while the
friends of both sides took up, the chorus, 'Aziz and The Refuge
with a strict eye upon me, knowing my weakness towards the
latter stages of such long-drawn-out batdes.
They were quite right. Next morning, after the night's
meditation, the jajim was handed to us from a doorway as
we passed.
This was the last night of my adventure, and in the stufiy
lower air by the splashing fountain of the little garden, over-
arched by unfamiliar branches of trees after the open hills, I
could not sleep. I roused 'Aziz early, but failed to make him
move: and when at last we started down the valley, two
thousand workmen were already on the road, and we had to
pass by nearly all of them.
" God give you strength, God give you strength," The
Refuge continued to say politely as we passed each shift.
They were sturdy, pleasant-looking countrymen with little of
the navvy look of such people in Europe. They got, I was
told, three krans [6d.] a day, and came from the villages around.
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