In this manner I succeed in ridding the telegraph-office of the crowd;
but there is no getting rid of the visitors. Everybody in the place who
thinks himself a little better than the ragamuffin ryots comes and squats
on his hams in the little hut-like office, sips the telegraph-jee's
sweetened tea, smokes his kalians, and spends the afternoon in staring
wonderingly at me and the bicycle. Having picked up a little Persian
during the winter, I am able to talk with them, and understand them,
rather better than last season, and, Persian-like, they ply me
mercilessly with questions. Often, when some one asks a question of me,
Mirza Hassan, as becomes a telegraphies, and a person of profound
erudition, thoughtfully saves me the trouble of replying by undertaking
to furnish the desired information himself. One old mollah wants to know
how many farsakhs it is from Aivan-i-Kaif to Yenghi Donia (New
World-America); ere I can frame a suitable reply, Mirza Hassan forestalls
my intentions by answering, in a decisive tone of voice that admits of no
appeal, "Khylie!" "Khylie" is a handy word that the Persians always fall
back on when their knowledge of great numbers or long distances is vague
and shadowy; it is an indefinite term, equivalent to our word "many."
Mirza Hassan does not know whether America is two hundred farsakhs away
or two thousand, but he knows it to be "khylie farsakhs," and that is
perfectly satisfactory to himself, and the white-turbaned questioner is
perfectly satisfied with "khylie" for an answer.

A person from the New World is naturally a rara avis with the simple
villagers of Aivan-i-Kaif, and their inquisitiveness concerning Yenghi
Donia and Yenghi Donians fairly runs riot, and shapes itself into all
manner of questions. They want to know whether the people smoke kalians
and ride horses--real horses, not asps-i-awhans-in Yenghi Donia, and
whether the Valiat smoked the kalian with me at Hadji Agha. Mirza Hassan