I saw, while walking up the hill, a native fill a cup from an open drain and drink it off, although the smell was unbearable, the liquid of a dark-brown colour.
A very common and--in the absence of medical treatment--fatal disease among the inhabitants of the suburbs (chiefly Afghans) is stone in the bladder, the water here, though pure and clear in the suburbs, containing a large quantity of lime.
The bazaar, through which we passed on our way to the Mir, does not seem a very busy one.

Although not a public or religious holiday, many of the stalls were closed.

Kelat was once the great channel for merchandise from Kandahar and Cabul 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 Afghanistan are very unsafe.

Only a few weeks previous to my visit, a Kelat merchant, proceeding with a large caravan to Kerman, in Persia, was robbed and murdered in the frontier district west of Kharan.