Burnes, Alexander: Travels into Bokhara: containing the narrative of a voyage on the Indus from the sea to Lahore, ... and an account of a journey from India to Cabool, Tartary and Persia ; performed by order of the supreme government of India, in the years 1831, 32, and 33 (Band 3) (London, 1835)

64

TROUBLED COUNTRY.

CHAP. XIII.

put four of their peasants to death. One wonders
that human beings would consent to live in such a
spot. The circle of the villages around Meshid
gets more circumscribed yearly, and in the one
which we first entered every field had its tower,
built by the cultivator, as a defence to which he
might fly on seeing the approach of a Toorkmun.
What a state of society, that requires the plough-
share and the sword in the same field ! We loaded
the camels after a watch of night, and set out for
Meshid, the gates of which we reached long before
the sun had risen, not more to our own joy than
that of the poor Persian slaves, who had performed
every step of the journey with a palpitating
breast.