He is the most persistent "gazer" I have yet met in Asia;
hour after hour he squats on his hams at my feet and stares intently into
my face, as though trying hard to read my inmost thoughts. Oriental-like,
he is fascinated by the mystery of my appearance here, and there is no
such thing as shaking off his silent, wondering gaze for a minute. He is
on hand promptly in the morning to watch my rude matinual toilet, and he
always watches me retire for the night. Even when I betake myself to a
retired part of the garden in the dusk of evening to take a sluice-bath
with a bucket of water, his white-robed figure is always loitering near.
Four men are stationed about my bungalow at night; their respective
armaments vary from a Martini-Henry rifle attached to a picturesque
Asiatic stock, owned by Abdur Rahman Khan, to an immense knobbed cudgel
wielded by a titleless youth named Osman.
Osman's sole wardrobe consists of a coarse night-shirt style of garment,
that in the early part of its career was probably white, but which is now
neither white nor equal to the task of protecting him from the
penetrating rays of the summer sun. His occupation appears to be that of
all-round utility man for whomsoever cares to order him about. Osman has
to bring water and pour it on my hands whenever I want to wash, hie him
away to the bazaar to search for dates or anything my epicurean taste
demands in addition to what is provided, feed the horse, change the
position of the pee-wit to keep it in the shade, sweep out my bungalow,
and perform all sorts of menial offices.
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