160 KHANUI AND ORDAM-PADSHAH [CHAP. Ix.
for Chinese officials and better-class travellers, surprisingly clean, and gratefully availed myself of its deep, shady veranda for a short rest while the camels came up. It was nearly five o'clock before my eyes again rested on green fields and trees. Kok-robat (` ` the Green Station ") receives its water, and with it fertility, from a stream coming from the hill range that was dimly visible in the west. I had to ride through the main village, spreading its houses in a single street over a mile long, before I found an arbour suitable for my camp. I could not have desired a shadier or more secluded grove. Curiously enough there was no proper entrance through the wall enclosing it. But sun-dried bricks are a material easily handled and replaced. So when my choice was made the owner without much trouble knocked a hole in the wall and thus established easy communication between the ` Bostan ' and his courtyard, where my servants were quartered. The yellow leaves lay thick under the walnut and other fruit-tree's, a sad memento of rapidly advancing autumn.
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