1 472
2 BULKK
3 €£ tihe Uzbeks, appeui to be unjust, and is pfdbaUy owing partlj to
4 our oonfoundiDg them with the Gdrnnks, and other rude Tartar
5 tribes b^w<eeii llieiii aod RuanB, and partly to the ^imwlm through
6 which we have received our information regarding them. Tfasir
7 habit of selling slaves might have justified the prgudice against them,
8 but this detestable traffic unfortunately was not confined to the Uz-
9 beks. T!i('ir liiws of war are certainly most barbarous. Thev give
10 no qiKirtei to any enemies but sheealis or infidels, whom they can
11 sell for slaves, and men are sold in Hokliaura like cattle; but in other
12 respect*?, by all that I can learn, botli from Afghaun travellers, and
13 from Taujikii ot Bulkli and Bokhuura, I have reason to think the
14 Uzbeks as good a people as any in Asia.
15 They are said to be oomperadvely sincere and honert. Hiey have
16 few quarreb among individualsy andMSWoely any mmdeit } ind tboie
17 m few oountn ln HheaMtywliere « stranger would be moceit«fla
18 TiMMe who imagine die Uibdbi to be savage TtfCan, waadmmg over
19 tvild aod desolato icgioiu, will be aupiiaed to beer tbit <he taty of
20 Boldiinis ii eqpal in popnktioa to PeAftwer, and oonaoquflntfyiup^i
21 fior to my in En^andU esceept London. Tliat it eontaina nmnenoi
22 eoDcgea* whicb mi^t aeoonimodate from GO to 600 * students eacfa»
23 and which have profeason paid by the King, of by pitvate founds-
24 tiena } that it abounds in camranBenus, where merchants of eQ nations
25 meet with gfetit enflom»geni«it j and that all religions are fotty
26 tolerated by a prince and people, above all others attached to their
27 own belief. I now retum to the hiatoxy aod pretent state of the
28 province of Bulkh.
29 • The coUfgc of Kokul Taush, for instance, has 300 apartments, in each of which
30 two students can be lodged. This account of the colleges, and some other information of
31 which I have availed myself, is contMned in an account transmitted by Meer Izzut OoUah's
32 agents Bokhaura, in a letter dated Afiril 1813. I nms\, however, guard the reader
33 arrninst imagining that the colleges are h* M like those of Europe. TTi* ,ri( rict-s principally
34 studied are thecdogy and Mahommedan kw, and in moat of those wiucb we Talue, tiie
35 UiMn Mv mt MBHM IBO JV|pwwit aMBnB% nnr wntufiiBi n pnenwa uf tntMUtf
36 p}iyuci III ~ i rom^ iqp IB oAw wnintiin^ ■md many ftajfie of BoUuuua con» to Pedbswcr
37 Sot education.
38 Digitized by Google