United States or Vietnam ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


Great caravans en route for Khotan, Yarkand, and even Chinese Tibet arrived daily from Kashmir, the Panjab, and Afghanistan, and stacked their bales of goods in the place; the Lhassa traders opened shops in which the specialties were brick tea and instruments of worship; merchants from Amritsar, Cabul, Bokhara, and Yarkand, stately in costume and gait, thronged the bazaar and opened bales of costly goods in tantalising fashion; mules, asses, horses, and yaks kicked, squealed, and bellowed; the dissonance of bargaining tongues rose high; there were mendicant monks, Indian fakirs, Moslem dervishes, Mecca pilgrims, itinerant musicians, and Buddhist ballad howlers; bold-faced women with creels on their backs brought in lucerne; Ladakis, Baltis, and Lahulis tended the beasts, and the wazir's jemadar and gay spahis moved about among the throngs.

"C'est la Cigarette!" ran from mouth to mouth, as the bay mare with her little Amazon rider, followed by the scarlet cloud of the Spahis, all ablaze like poppies in the sun, rose in sight, thrown out against the azure of the skies.

There were coaches, cabs, curricles, military supply wagons, great carts of hay drawn by oxen, some squadrons of Chasseurs d'Afrique, troops of microscopic little donkeys, negresses selling galettes, loads of emigrants from Alsasce, some Spahis in red cloaks.

Her sister and brother-in-law called her the savage worshipper, and took her down to the café on the terrace to dine. And all through dinner mademoiselle talked of the beaux Spahis in the plural, with a secret reservation in her heart. After Algiers our Parisians went by way of Constantine to Biskra.

Tarzan's first mission did not bid fair to be either exciting or vastly important. There was a certain lieutenant of SPAHIS whom the government had reason to suspect of improper relations with a great European power.

It was a large cavalcade that left the oasis, for the new Chief required a bigger escort to support his dignity than the Captain of Spahis had done. The days passed without incident. Despite Craven's desire to reach England the journey was in every way enjoyable. When he had actually started his restlessness decreased, for each successive sunrise meant a day nearer home.

We passed some Turcos, happy-looking children but ill companions in a hostile country, and some Spahis with flowing burnous, who looked ridiculously out of place, and then, after a long search it was dark on the road and very cold we found the Division.

The spahis durst not wait the shock of such an encounter; they wheeled to the right-about, and clapping spurs to their horses, fled in the utmost disorder. This was actually the circumstance that turned the scale of battle.

Hôtel des Colonies, Marseilles; steamboat, Le Général Chanzy; five o'clock on a splendid, sunny afternoon Algiers, with its terraces, its white villas, its palms, trees, and its Spahis!" "But " I began. He foresaw my objection. "There were Spahis, and that's a point of my story. Some fête was on in the town while our Parisians were there.

"We were a couple of friends followed by eight spahis and four camels with their drivers. We were no longer talking, overcome by heat, fatigue, and a thirst such as had produced this burning desert. Suddenly one of our men uttered a cry. We all halted, surprised by an unsolved phenomenon known only to travelers in these trackless wastes.