resemblance whatever to "an apple"
it was this mountain. It would be curious to know what Major Sykes calls
"an apple."

The diagram here appended of the outline of the mountain, and indeed the
photograph given by Major Sykes in the _Royal Geographical Society's
Journal_, February, 1902, page 143, will, I think, be sufficient to
convince the least observant on this point. Major Sykes is also no less
than 500 feet out in his estimate of the height of the hill. The summit
is 900 feet above the plain--not 400 feet as stated by him.

The altitude at the base is 2,050 feet, and at the summit 2,950 feet. As
we rounded the mountain to the southward to find a place at which we
could climb to the top, we saw a very ancient fort perched on the summit
of the mountain commanding the ruins of Kala-i-Kakaha, or the "city of
roars of laughter,"--a quaint and picturesque city built on the steep
slope of the south escarpment of the mountain.

[Illustration: Sketch Map of Summit of Kuh-i-Kwajah

by A. Henry Savage Landor.]

In the centre of this city was a large and high quadrangular wall like a
citadel, and it had houses all round it, as can be seen by the bird's-eye
view photograph I took of it from the fort above, a view from which high
point of vantage will be described at the end of this chapter.

We went along the outer wall of the city on a level with the plain at the
hill's base, but we abandoned it as this wall went up the mountain side
to the north. Some high columns could be seen, which appeared to have
formed part of a high tower. The sides of the hill on which the city was
built were very precipitous, but a steep tortuous track existed, leading
to the city on the east side, the two gates of the city being
situated--one north-east, the other north-west--in the rear of the city,
and, as it were, facing the mountain side behind. On the south-west side
high accumulations of sand formed an extensive tongue projecting very far
out into the plain.

The rocky upper portion of the Kuh-i-Kwajah mountain was black towards
the east, but getting yellowish in the southern part, where there were
high sand accumulations up to about three-quarters of the height of the
mountain, with deep channels cut into them by water.

We came to a narrow gorge which divides the mountain in two, and by which
along a very stony path between high vertical rocks the summit of the
table mountain could be reached. We left our horses in charge of a lanc