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Many of his subjects were natives of Seistan, Kharán, and Shotrawák, all Afghan border districts, and gave him at times no little trouble. My genial old host had himself given a good deal of trouble to the Kelát Government in his younger days, and told me with evident pride that he had led many a chupao in the good old days.
Such is the history of the conquest of Kelat. How many souls were suddenly hurled into eternity! How many unprepared to meet their Judge, because their sins were unpardoned, and their souls unwashed! But in war, who thinks of souls and sins! O horrible war! How hateful to the Prince of Peace! September 13, 1839.
Bellew, a more recent traveller, in the month of January found the temperature even lower, as when at Rodinjo, thirteen miles south of Kelát, the thermometer at 7 a.m. stood at 14° Fahr., while the next night, at Kelát, it fell to 8° Fahr. The weather was at the time clear, sharp, and cold, the ground frozen hard all day, while snow-wreaths lay in the shelter of the walls.
Every moment I expected to hear the crack of a pistol-shot, followed by a general mêlée. Arrived at the Mastung Gate, we dismounted, and, leaving our horses in charge of the guard, slowly proceeded up the steep narrow streets to the citadel. The entrance to Kelát is not imposing.
The climate of Baluchistán presents extraordinary varieties, and is extremely trying to Europeans. Although at Kelát the natives suffer considerably more from cold in winter than summer heats, the hot season in the low-lying valleys and on the coast, which lasts from April till October, may be almost said to be the most severe in the world.
So far as I could glean, the court of Kelát has no influence whatsoever beyond a radius of twenty miles or so from that city. Practically, however, the latter has little or no supremacy over them, nor indeed over any part of Baluchistán, Kelát and its suburbs excepted.
Although not a public or religious holiday, many of the stalls were closed. Kelát was once the great channel for merchandise from Kandahár and Cábul to India, but the caravan trade is now insignificant. There is in the season a considerable traffic in dates, but that is all, for the roads to Persia and Afghanistán are very unsafe.
Our Baluchis could not or would not explain the raison d'être of them, though the stones must, in many instances, have been brought great distances and for a definite purpose. I could not, however, get any explanation regarding them at either Kelát or Quetta.
It is allowed to collect in great pools, which in long-continued wet weather often flood the houses and drive their wretched inhabitants into the open, to live as best they may, further up the hill. Kelát is, for this reason only, very unhealthy. Small-pox, typhoid, and typhus are never absent, though, curiously enough, cholera visitations are rare.
On my mentioning the day before that I had intended entering India viâ Cábul, he at once said, "Ah! I supposed Alikhanoff stopped you. He is very shy of strangers." We left Kelát at 6 a.m. on the 12th of April. The camels and heavy baggage had been sent on four or five hours previously to Mangachar, the first station.
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