1 { 254 )
2 CHAP. Via
3 OP THl INHABITAKTS OP TOWNS.
4 I HAVE hitlierto contined myself to those points of character or
5 niuiijiers which apply to the whole, or iiciiily the whole, of the
6 Atghaiin nation. I shall now proceed to tic.scribe the peculiaxities of
7 the different classes of which it is composed. Enough has been said,
8 for the present, ol' the difference betwaen the eattem and western
9 A^iamiB ; aome particular orders of men hsTe also beai incsidentally
10 described ; and tl^ pastoral and agricultural chases will be ^oken of
11 in great detafl hereafter. Tlie first description of people whom I
12 have now to examine, aie* theieifoie> the inhdbitanta of towns; and here
13 one is struck with the circwmatance, that the greater part of this branch
14 of the popnlation is not composed of Aigftanns. ItmajseemstiaD^to
15 a person in £aiope» that thie towna should not be inhabited bjr the
16 nuMrtera of the country, yet such was the case in England after the
17 Nonnan inrasbut and such it still is In Uabek, Tartaiy, and m aome
18 meaaune in Fersk $ and probaUy the reason has in all caaes been the
19 same; the ruling nation has though it degrading to pumue the trades
20 .which assemble men in towns, and none have revded there but great
21 men and their retainers, who are drawn thither by the court; ao>
22 ooldingly, the only A%hauns who reside in towns, are great men and
23 their followers, soldiers, Moollabs, a few who Ibllow commerce (a pur-
24 suit not despised among this people), and wma of the pooiest of the
25 nation, who worit as labourers. No Alghaun ever keeps a shop^ or
26 exercises any handicraft trade. The greater part of the people em-
27 ployed in these occupations, are Taujiks, a nation who are intermixed
28 wUh the A%hauns in great numbers, throughout all the western part
29 Digrtized by Googl