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EX-KING OF AFGHANISTAN

naphtha flames. The main street was half covered with a
patchwork quilt of sacking and wicker. It must have
kept out the sun at midday, but at night the fumes made
the little street noxious. Fruit was everywhere. There
were piles of rich green and yellow and red apples, and
melons and sweet grapes. We stopped, to deliver a note
to a stall-keeper from the driver's master, and I indicated
a big bunch of grapes and held out a handful of coins.
The dealer took the smallest, and poured back into my
hand a shower of square and bent and misshapen coins.
The grapes, I found out, cost little more than a penny a
bunch, and were the staple food of beggars. We were in
an upside-down land.

The city was a complete contrast to the village in the
hills. The dealers and the shoppers were cheerful and
gay in their dress, and seemed ever ready with a laugh
and a greeting. The townspeople were taking what
seemed to be their evening leisure and sauntered from
stall to stall, where there were displayed all the finery
and the products that they could wish to buy. A rich,
thriving city, it seemed, and I was almost sorry when we
drove through it towards the new Government Rest
House.

Except for the Customs at Dacca, this was the first
manifestation I had had of the new regime under Aman-
ullah. Counting on the inrush of visitors who would
wish to journey to Kabul, he had wisely placed their
accommodation under the wing of the Government, and
though the scheme could never have been a paying
proposition, his efforts for the comfort of those who were
seeing his country must have been well appreciated.
They certainly were by one traveller, that August night,
when the prospect of rest seemed delicious, and the wide
verandah of the bungalow gave a simple but ample
welcome*

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