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DIFFICULTIES WITH CAMELS 35
the northern side of Ak Dagh, and thence runs away
from the sea to join the Yeshil Irmak at Amasia.
When the gorge opens a little a strip of cultivated
land fills the bottom. Here are flour-mills too,—in a
land of small rainfall and deficient rivers they gather
thickly beside each suitable stream,—with something
of the traditional romance of all country flour-mills
driven by water or wind. One here lay white in
the sunshine, a few trees beside it ; there was the
flashing of water, the purring of stones, the kindly
white dust of flour on everything within, and a sense
of the miller being a hearty, prosperous, independent
fellow. These Ottoman millers, like millers the world
over, are charged with making illicit gains ; but a
custom of the country bears hardly upon them sometimes,
for a body of farmers will go now and then and
give a miller of undue prosperity a beating.
In parts of this gorge the narrow road went with
a low stone wall between it and a sheer deep drop
to the river. Caravan followed caravan—hundreds
of camels in line, whose loads, projecting like a great
pannier on either side, sometimes left little room
for passing vehicles ; and camels go straight and do
not step aside for anything. But that was Achmet's
trouble, not mine. I had got into the bottom of the
gorge and could hear him shouting from time to time,
and see the caravans like a moving chain crawling
slowly along the mountain- side.
Camels travel tied head and tail, from saddle to
head-stall, in sevens or eights. The halters of horsehair
rope are of great strength, but in the coupling
between each pair of animals a link is provided breakable
by slight strain. You may see a camel suddenly
fling his head into the air and snap this link, the
wisp of wool by which his halter is tied to the saddle
of the next in front. That is as it should be, what
the weak link is for, and the camel-man comes back
presently and restores the lashing. You are told that
had nothing given way the beast would have gone
mad, and begun to plunge and scream, and set the