'THIM DAYS IS GONE' [‎56r] (111/248)

57
Unfortunately the time one could be absent from one's
headquarters was limited by a regulation that
one's cyphers unguarded for more than three
possible to explore the area fairly
short dashes.
one
days .
thoroughly
could not 1eave
However it was
in a series of
The Hamims were
. , . _ navigated in (or on) boats made from bundles of
reeds (as in the marshes of Southern Iraq) po)ed by a str e
race of peoole called sayy ads , ('hunters'), along narrow
The immense variety of
almost entirely on game.
( as
of peop1e
channels between towering reed-beds.
bird-life was entrancing and one lived
Beyond the expanses of water and intervening flat land that
comprised Seistan was the towering plateau of Palang Kuh, abode
of ibex and leopard, and visited by wandering Baluchis who came
to gather asafoetida to sell in India. I was fortunate enough to
make contact with an intriguing character known as Mullah Kuhi
(the Priest of the mountains). He was a Baluch who,"owing to a
mi s-understanding with the forces of law and order,felt it
politic to give them as wide a berth as possible. As he related
1 * _ 1S , encam Pment had been approached without warning by a partv
of Gendarmerie and, quite naturally, he and his followers had
fired several rifle shots in their general direction. This as
every tribesman knows, is merely their way of saying "Keep your
distance and explain your business before coming any closer "
However apparently the gendarmes did not observe this convention
and - f !'° m then on the 'mountainy mullah' was a wanted man. He
r??il? ed i 1 a ^ h1 ^ occupation at the time had been smuggling
a* 1anded oo the Persian shore of the Gulf to the tribesmen
or Afghanistan - a practice disapproved of strongly by the
British Indian authorities and, under pressure, by the Persians
unless, of course, the customary rake-off was paid by the
smugglers, which in the Mullah's case it obviously had not been.
Living, as he had to, in deserts and mountains, he had become an
expert s h i k ar i and was well versed in the habits
Unfortunatelylis religious faith was somewhat of a
of the game,
hindrance.
Whereas I insisted on leaving camp before dawn, and scaling the
mountain to a vantage point whence one might spot ibex before
they retired from the heat of the sun into crannies and caves
the Mullah reckoned that this was a waste of time; Allah he
maintained, would bring the ibex to one's tent-door if he wished
one to shoot it!
The Palang Kuh is an uneven plateau surrounded by absolutely
fnntlhn H about 1,000 ft high presenting no visible
foot-hold from top to bottom, yet astonishingly these precioices
represented safety for the Ibex. One morningwe found evidence
or an attack by a leopard on a group of ibex grazing on the level
ground of the plateau. It was clear from the tracks that the
eopard had his claws out, and it had only been a matter of
inches before the ibex were able to dive over the precipice,
eering down, and fighting against vertigo, one was unable to see