und in the neighbourhood of this place, and wild asses (_ghorkhar_)
nearer Sahib Chah. _Katunga_ (sand grouse), _sisi_, _chickor_, a few
small bustards (_habara_), and occasionally ducks are to be seen near the
water, but taking things all round there is little on the road to repay
the sportsman who is merely in search of game.
[Illustration: Circular Ziarat With Stone, Marble and Horn Offerings.]
[Illustration: Ziarat with Tomb showing Stone Vessels.]
The spacious rest-house at Dalbandin was quite palatial, with actual
panes of glass in all the windows, mats on the floor, folding chairs to
sit upon, tables and Indian bedsteads. Thanks to the kind hospitality of
Captain Webb-Ware, I had a most pleasant and instructive day's rest here,
and nearly made myself sick by greedily eating irresistible Beluch dates,
the most delicious it has ever been my luck to taste. These dates are
very carefully prepared in earthen jars with honey, and they say that
only one date--the best--is picked from each tree. No description could
ever come up to their delicate flavour.
There is a famous Ziarat a couple of miles from Dalbandin which well
repays a visit. The larger Ziarat itself is circular, 25 feet in
diameter, with a mud and stone wall 4 feet high round it. It has a door
to the east and a tomb to the west. A bundle of sticks is laid outside
the wall, and another much larger, with red and white rags upon it, at
the head of the tomb, the latter being covered as usual with pieces of
white marble and round stones. At the head of the grave near the upright
sticks was a large stone with holes in the centre, and also a number of
wooden drinking cups, masses of horns, sticks, whips, ends of broken
bottles, bits of rope, etc. These fragments of civilization hardly added
to its picturesqueness. The tomb lay from north to south--a very curious
fact, for, as a rule, the head of the tomb in other Ziarats was to the
west. The tomb, however, lay in the western portion of the Ziarat circle.
The enclosing wall was adorned with horns of sacrificed goats, and, in
fact, outside to the south was the sacrificial spot with some large slabs
of stone smeared with blood, and the usual upright sticks, but no rags
appended to them. It had, nevertheless, some decoration of horns.
A second Ziarat was to be found on the top of the hill--generally these
Ziarats go in couples, the principal one on the summit of a hill, the
other at the foot, the latter for th
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