POSTIN, a body coat, a fur cloak or coat, a sheepskin coat or vest, much worn in Afghanistan. The sheepskin is prepared with the wool on After being curried, and the wool cleaned with soap and combed, the skin is stretched on boards by means of nails at the corners,' with the inner surface uppermost. This is daily, four or five times, smeared over with a thin moist paste, composed of equal parts of fine wheaten and rice flour, with which is mixed a little finely powdered salt. It is then cleared of the paste, again washed and scraped, and laid out in the open air to dry, and again put on the stretcher, and has rubbed on it of nnmeorRnate rind. alum, and — ...-...
red ochre, or alum alone. It Is then allowed to dry for a few days; the tanning mixture is that scraped off, and the skin firmly rubbed with a wooden roller, and it is rendered soft and pliant by crumpling it between the hands, beating it with thin twigs. It is one of the most important of the industrial occupations of the people of Kandahar, Ghazni, and Kibul, and of late years has been largely increased for export to the Panjab, where the native army of lintiah India had adopted it as a w inter dress; also to Peshawur.
Coats are made by the tailor cutting the skin in strips of 24 inches long, and 4 or 5 inches wide, and stitching these together. Three kinds of coats are made,—the pustinclia, short and with out arms, and the postaki, which reaches to the knees, and has long sleeves, for which five or six skins are needed ; also the postin, which are very large, loose, cumbrous cloaks, reaching from head to feet, with long, wide sleeves reaching beyond the fingers. They cost from 1 to 50 rupees, and the woolly side is worn next the body, which harbours vermin. Khosai poshto are cloaks made in Kandahar of white felt, worn by the Afghan peasants.—MacGregor, p. 48 ; Burton's Scinde, p. 40.