as early as the time of the Hindu grammarian Panini, say three centuries B.C.  The cord twisted round the head was probably also a relic of Kafir costume:  “Few of the Kafirs cover the head, and when they do, it is with a narrow band or fillet of goat’s hair ... about a yard or a yard and a half in length, wound round the head.”  This style of head-dress seems to be very ancient in India, and in the Sanchi sculptures is that of the supposed Dasyas.  Something very similar, i.e. a scanty turban cloth twisted into a mere cord, and wound two or three times round the head, is often seen in the Panjab to this day.

The Postin or sheepskin coat is almost universal on both sides of the Hindu Kush; and Wood notes:  “The shoes in use resemble half-boots, made of goatskin, and mostly of home manufacture.” (Baber, 145; J.  A. S. B. XXVIII. 348, 364; Elphinst. II. 384; Ind.  Antiquary, I. 22; Wood, 174, 220; J.  R. A. S. XIX. 2.)

NOTE 4.—­Marsden was right in identifying Scassem or Casem with the Kechem of D’Anville’s Map, but wrong in confounding the latter with the Kishmabad of Elphinstone—­properly, I believe, Kishnabad—­in the Anderab Valley.  Kashm, or Keshm, found its way into maps through Petis de la Croix, from whom probably D’Anville adopted it; but as it was ignored by Elphinstone (or by Macartney, who constructed his map), and by Burnes, it dropped out of our geography.  Indeed, Wood does not notice it except as giving name to a high hill called the Hill of Kishm, and the position even of that he omits to indicate.  The frequent mention of Kishm in the histories of Timur and Humayun (e.g. P. de la Croix, I. 167; N. et E. XIV. 223, 491; Erskine’s Baber and Humayun, II. 330, 355, etc.) had enabled me to determine its position within tolerably narrow limits; but desiring to fix it definitely, application was made through Colonel Maclagan to Pandit Manphul, C.S.I., a very intelligent Hindu gentleman, who resided for some time in Badakhshan as agent of the Panjab Government, and from him arrived a special note and sketch, and afterwards a MS. copy of a Report,[1] which set the position of Kishm at rest.

KISHM is the Kilissemo, i.e.  Karisma or Krishma, of Hinen Tsang; and Sir H. Rawlinson has identified the Hill of Kishm with the Mount Kharesem of the Zend-Avesta, on which Jamshid placed the most sacred of all the fires.  It is now a small town or large village on the right bank of the Varsach river, a tributary of the Kokcha.  It was in 1866 the seat of a district ruler under the Mir of Badakhshan, who was styled the Mir of Kishm, and is the modern counterpart of Marco’s Quens or Count.  The modern caravan-road between Kunduz and Badakhshan does not pass through Kishm, which is left some five miles to the right, but through the town of Mashhad, which stands on the same river.  Kishm is the warmest district of Badakhshan.  Its fruits are abundant, and ripen a month earlier than those at Faizabad, the capital of that country.  The Varsach or Mashhad river is Marco’s “Flum auques grant.”  Wood (247) calls it “the largest stream we had yet forded in Badakhshan.”