Caravans By Night

If you go to the Great Bazaar, which lies west of the Old Palace at Indore, you will see him sitting upon a cushion in his alcove-like shop, a very magnificent figure in flowing robes and gold-edged turban. You will find him busy, whether you visit the bazaar in mid-morning or in the afternoon; or even after sunset, when lamps embroider the lacework of lanes and alleys. He is an amiable fellow and he will talk for hours—of silks, of jewels (for in those luxuries he deals), or still more eloquently of Peshawar, where the blue peaks of the Hindu Kush let their lips caress the sky as though it were the cheek of some siren. But mention the barbarian with corn-colored hair, or the blue-eyed Punjabi, and he will suddenly become as uncommunicative as the tongueless fakir who sits before the Anna Chuttra and mutely pleads for alms.