Page:Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, Volume 1 (2nd edition).djvu/253

Rh women is proverbial. The men are a strong and healthy race, though more fitted for fatigue than activity. Rotundity is the mark of greatness, and considered as a beauty; prescriptions for increasing bulk are in much esteem. Many of the Belooch chiefs and officers of their court are too large for the dimensions of any European chair. Under a government where extortion, ignorance, and tyranny are, perhaps, unequalled in the world, they are avaricious, full of deceit, cruel, ungrateful, proud, impatient, knavish, mean, fanatical, and superstitious. According to Crow, they have no zeal but for the propagation of their religious faith; no spirit but in celebrating the Eed; no liberality but in feeding lazy Seyuds; and no taste but in ornamenting old tombs. Their good qualities appear to consist in personal bravery, abstinence, capability of making great exertions, and unqualified submission. They are not regardless either, nor deficient in fidelity and hospitality, which latter is probably imposed upon them by their religion. And their mental energies and natural faculties also appear good.

Their active diversions are shooting and clapping with their swords. They are good marksmen with their matchlocks, and inimitably dexterous with their bows and a blunt heavy arrow which they use for game, and dart in a transverse instead of a straight direction, so that the body, and not the point of the arrow, strikes the object. With these arrows they kill partridges flying to the right and left, as expeditiously as any European sportsman with a double-barrelled gun.

The courtiers and soldiery are addicted to the use of opium and blumg (Cannabis sativa); great quantities of assafœtida are also used by them as food. The Ameers are, however, much less sunk in sensuality and indulgence than most Mahommedan princes; and, according to Dr. Burnes, they never indulge in intoxicating drugs and liquors.

The Ameers and their attendants are dressed nearly alike, in Angricas or tunics of fine white muslin, neatly prepared and plaited so as to resemble dimity, with cummerbunds or sashes of silk and gold, wide Turkish trowsers of silk tied at the ankle, chiefly dark blue, and cylindrical caps made of gold brocade or embroidered velvet. With the exception of the Cashmere shawls and the loongees or sashes, which are made at Tattah, the cloths worn are generally of European manufacture. Longees are made for sashes, turbans, &c.; some are of silk, others of silk and cotton, and many of them are exceedingly rich and costly, with much gold embroidery. During the cold season the muslin tunics are laid aside, and the Ameers wear robes or cloaks made of the most valuable description of Cashmere shawls, gorgeously embroidered with gold lace, and lined with the black fur of Candahar. Sometimes the apparel consists of European damask silks or