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students, together with the relatives and friends of the deceased. They appoint a. priest to perform a complete recital of the Koran," and give him the deceased's shoes and stockings as his perquisites, together with a suit of new clothes and a small sum of money. They pay the gravedigger two or three Tanga, and sacrifice a sheep over the grave, and its carcase is taken by the officiating priest as his perquisite. This ends the funeral ceremony as observed by the common people. The wealthy retain a priest to recite the Koran daily over the grave for forty days, and feast the relations and friends, and the poor and priests on the third, the seventh, and the fortieth days.
The grave and side sepulchre are on the Musalman plan, but tombstones are not used except for saints and grandees, and in such cases the epitaph is found written on glazed tiles. Most graves are seen with merely a heap of earth piled along their length, but some have tombs raised over them. Generally the tomb is an oblong platform, two or three feet, high, and supports a cylindrical figure along its length, something in the shape of a coffin, and the whole is built of raw bricks or clay, coated with a plaster of mud. Grave-yards are generally enclosed, and their area held as sacred ground.
I-abitation$.—The cities and towns in general appearance and plan of arrangement much resemble those of Afghanistan, and some parts of Persia to the west. They are surrounded by fortified walls, and are everywhere built of clay, stone being never seen, and baked bricks only in the more important buildings, such as mosques, colleges, and saraes. The streets are unpaved, and wind irregularly amongst the blocks and rows of tenements, and are mostly narrow and more or less filthy. There are no large open spaces, nor any public gardens or plantations. The drains and gutters are mostly open, or indifferently covered for footway in front of the shops ; and empty on to some low ground only a few yards beyond the city walls, or else stagnate within their enclosure. In some of the quarters, shut off from the main bazars and thoroughfares, are open tanks 40 to 60 or 100 feet square ; they are mere superficial excavations, and, as their contents indicate, a collection of all the impurities of the vicinity dissolved in the water. The main bazars are in parts covered in by a frame-work of rough beams and rafters, thatched with a loose layer of straw and reeds, through which are numerous gaps. The shops themselves are mean, low, and dark hovels, with a platform in front raised some three or four feet above the level of the street. They are of small dicnenslons and have no pretension to regularity, neatness, or decoration. In fact they cannot compare either in build or in the display of stores to the shops of any cantonment bazar iu India, far less to those of the commercial cities of the Panjab.
The style of building is entirely devoid of architectural character, and the only structures that attract attention amidst the jumble of mud walls and flat roofs, are some mosques and colleges of ancient date, and one or two newly-built masonry saraes. The former are as notable for their state of neglect and decay as are the latter for the opposite characters.
The dwelling-houses are mostly single-storied, in long rows, on each side of the streets ; but off the main lines of traffic the tenements are found more frequently double-storied. Those of the gentry are enclosed with a court or garden plot inside high walls, the entrance to which is through a double portal, between the gates of which is a roofed space for horses to stand, and a raised platform on one side for the gatekeeper. The arrangement of the interior is more regular, and consists of low chambers opening on to a central hall, which again conducts to an open verandah covered in from the court and slightly raised above its level. The walls are seldom white-washed, and are furnished with numerous little alcoves or recesses which serve the purpose of shelves and cupboards. In the roof there is always a light and air-ventilator, usually a simple square opening, 20 inches to 2 feet each way, protected by a grating of wood-work for the interior apartments, but much wider and unprotected for the central hall. The fire-places are similar to those in English houses in their plan, and have chimney-flues and pieces, and a low line of masonry for fender. The doors are plain boards, single or double, and work on pivot-sockets, and are secured by a bolt of wood which passes into a bole in one side bracket, and is unlocked by an ingenious catch-key, also of wood. The windows are large and double, and resemble the doorways. The outer one is of lattice-work covered with paper, and opens by two folds; the inner one is of boards, and resembles the door in
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