'I want the cashier to leave to-morrow morning at four o'clock for Akmolinsk. Send the chestnut horses forward at once to the Noura River for a relay, and the bays to Badpak, and let him start with the piebalds: he can hire horses at Beresovski for the last stretch to Akmolinsk,' said Fordham.

'Your honor knows,' replied the starosta; 'but I have lived in this country many years and know the signs, and if the cashier leaves to-morrow for Akmolinsk, he will not return for at least three weeks: the thaw is beginning and the rivers will soon be in flood; he may reach Akmolinsk, but he will have time to drink much vodka before he can return.'

'But the money, the money!' said Fordham; 'we must have the money; he must go to Akmolinsk.'

'Your honor knows about the money,' cooed the starosta, 'but I know that if Ivan leaves for Akmolinsk tomorrow, he will not return for many weeks.'

Fordham's face was troubled; we had of late frequently disappointed the workmen through lack of cash, and we dreaded to think of another payless pay-day. But the starosta was right, and already, as we left the office, the air had a tender feeling. The next morning, there was no doubt; a warm wind was blowing, the ground was soft, little rivulets were trickling down the gullies; the starosta was right, spring had come. But, in spite of spring, there was no joy in Fordham's face when we met.

'What can we do?' he said. 'We cannot face our men again when pay-day comes, if we have no money; it will be a scandal.'

And the situation was serious; we were absolutely cut off from the world, without apparently any possibility of securing cash for at least a month. We inquired here, there, and everywhere; we could not scrape together a thousand roubles from all sources. And then the Kirghiz Kusain appeared and said,

'Your honor needs money?'

I was provoked and answered hastily, 'Of course I need money; every one needs money; you need it too.'

'Ah, but your honor needs it worse than I do.'

'And if I do, can you supply it?'

'No, your honor, I am a poor man; but there are Kirghiz who are rich, very rich; who keep their money in rouble bills, locked in their tin-bound trunks; there is Adam Bai, brother of Djingir, whose herd of mares you saw when we crossed the Noura together the other day: Djingir is rich, very rich, but he has not much money; Adam Bai is rich too, and he keeps his riches in money; perhaps he may lend you some of it, but he will charge a great deal. Oh, he is rich, he is very rich!' 'Kusain, we will go and see him where is he now??

'He is now in his tents on the Ilinski River behind the Kisil Tav mountains, thirty miles from here.'

'We will leave to-morrow and go and see him.'

'You cannot leave to-morrow to see Adam Bai. Your honor is a great lord and Adam Bai is a great lord; to-morrow I will send two messengers on horses, who will tell Adam Bai that you are coming, and the next day you can go yourself and Adam Bai will be ready to receive you.'

So on the third day, arrayed in our

most beautiful clothes, with our best teams harnessed three horses abreast, each with his attendant interpreter, and with numerous mounted guides and escorts, we dashed off at full gallop through our little village, out on to the rolling steppes. Three days of spring had worked a miracle. The air was balmy and moist, and a mat of flowers chased the snow as it fled up the hills. Spring on the steppe is an ecstasy of nascent life; flowers, birds, animals, all know that their day at last has come.

As we came near to Adam Bai's encampment, an escort of horsemen rode out to meet us and led us to the tent which had been prepared for us. It was a beautiful yurta or circular tent, about twenty-five feet in diameter, with an outside covering of snowy white felt supported on a light wooden trellis with dome-shaped roof. As there are no poles inside, the whole floor space is clear. The floor was covered with gorgeous rugs and the walls were hung with silk mats. We took off our shoes and entered. The tunduk or cover was partly thrown back, and the setting sun filled the tent with red light. Around our tent were those of Adam Bai and his followers. They were arriving from all sides, driving in the herds before them: great herds of camels and sheep and goats and some cattle, which sorted themselves without confusion, the sheep lying down by themselves, the camels by themselves, the goats by themselves, and the cattle by themselves. Nature is so harmonious when she is undisturbed. They lay together and waited patiently for the rest which comes with darkness. The old men were gathered by the doors of their tents. Rachel was drawing water from the well; so they had been doing for forty centuries and more. The cradle of our race had been rocked under these stars; here had our childhood been spent.

Adam Bai came in with his sons and his friends, his secretary and his bard, Izat by name. We sat in a circle on the rugs, and the huge skin of koumiss was brought in, which was ladled out to us in painted wooden bowls. A colt was led in and Adam Bai explained that he was about to slaughter it for us; but to his chagrin, we begged him to substitute a sheep. After the koumiss was finished, the samovar was brought in, and tea and sweets were served, with rock-like cheese and bursaks, little pellets of bread fried in tallow, the only food these people eat which is not either meat or milk.

The evening wore away in unceasing chatter, and I frequently asked Kusain whether the propitious moment for a business talk had arrived, and the answer was always 'No.' Finally, when our enfeebled western natures could absorb no more sour milk, several huge platters of boiled sheep were brought in; a young Kirghiz brought round to each person a copper kettle and bowl and poured water over our hands, and the real business of the day began. I never felt my inferiority so keenly before. Full to the high-water mark with tea and sour milk and sour cheese, I dipped my hand in my dish and made bold passes at the hateful meat; but all my ruses were detected and Adam Bai reproved my restraint, and, picking out with his fingers the eye of the sheep, which was lying lustreless in the sodden mass, he thrust it into my mouth - a compliment of peculiar meaning. Never have I felt so helpless! The power of swallowing seemed lost to me forever. It seemed to be hours that I turned that horrible eye round in my mouth. Somehow the merciful end came at last, and Adam Bai seized a huge lump of tallow and crammed it into the eager mouth of Kusain. What a delicious morsel to chew during the silent night!

Next morning we prepared to go, and I was growing alarmed lest the overwhelming hospitality of our host should thwart the business on which we came and which was so urgent; but at the last moment Kusain and the secretary had some conversation, and it was explained to me that Adam Bai, considering the watchful care which we had always taken of the poor unfortunate Kirghiz who were compelled to work for money, would lend us the sum of twenty thousand roubles, provided we would repay him twenty-two thousand roubles within one month. Visions of the successful trades which Jacob had made on these very hills flitted before our minds, and, bowing with profound respect to such historic precedents reenacted for our benefit, we invited this successful son of the desert to visit us at our office one week from that day and bring with him his treasure. But there was not one word from Adam Bai himself. He sat stolid and unmoved. Not tall, but very fat, as all rich Kirghiz must be, a mass of wadded and embroidered clothes, squatted crosslegged on the floor, his small well-kept hands folded in front of him, his face without the shadow of any expression. And he said 'Kosh' [good-bye], and we said 'Kosh,' and so we rolled away in our carriages, determined to take at least a correspondence-school course of desert training, before again attempting to enter the paths of high finance.

II

The days passed and pay-day was drawing near. The memory of the horrible meal we had made haunted us, and still more, the dread lest Adam Bai should fail us. As the workmen passed us they would ask, 'Will the money come?' and we set our teeth and replied, "The money will come'; and with 'Glory be to God' on their lips they

passed on. But one fine day the word reached us that to-morrow Adam Bai would come, and we killed the sheep and prepared to receive the wily financier. And the next morning he came with a rush; with a cloud of outriders, tearing at full gallop through the street, the drivers shouting and lashing their horses. In a disreputable-looking carriage, with impossible harness, Adam Bai was sitting like a Chinese idol with his poet by his side. And after he had divested himself of numerous fur coats, we escorted him to his seat of honor, in which he sat and grunted loudly, for it was a chair and he detested chairs, for they made his fat old body ache. But we felt a malicious delight in making him sit on our chairs, as the stork felt when he fed the fox from a long-necked bottle in return for the hospitality of the fox, which had fed him soup from a shallow platter.

Tea was brought in and conversation went on for an hour or more; and in the first pause, I said to Kusain, 'Ask him if he has brought the money.'

'Hush,' said Kusain, 'he might hear

"The true friend is like the oaken stick upon which you lean and rest,

But the false friend is like the reed upon which you lean and it breaks and the splinters pierce your hand.'

I ask Kusain, 'Is Adam Bai the oak or the reed? Has he brought the money?'

And Kusain replies again, ‘Hush, he might hear you!'

After the poet has finished, dinner is served, and several sheep rapidly disappear; but the only expression which Adam Bai's face betrays is anger with his hateful chair. He is fed by his at

ter nor under the table; it is short, and I must have it to make our bargain good.'

At this, the secretary began to look under papers, and Adam Bai assumed great interest in all the out-of-the-way corners where a stray three-rouble bill might lie, and they all looked at me in an injured way with their mild innocent eyes, till I felt ashamed of my insistence. But I waited while they hunted and every one hunted, until we were stopped by a cry from Adam Bai. 'See here,' he said (he was looking into his

sleeve), 'is it not strange, I have found a three-rouble bill up my sleeve; perhaps this is the one which was lost; I wonder how it got up my sleeve.'

O Adam Bai! Well art thou named Adam. Thou hast carried down to this generation the glorious tradition of original sin untarnished. Go in peace. Jacob's secrets are safe in thy hands.

And a deep silence fell on the room, and Adam Bai gathered up his clothes and left. And during the years which followed, he never forgave me our three roubles.