of Western Afyhanistan and North-Eastcrn Persia. 75 



fibre are Astragalus, several species, Apocynum venetum, 

 and Erianthus Eavenn^. 



Cotton is very extensively cultivated as a field crop ; the 

 quality of the fibre, however, is poor, and is far surpassed by 

 the produce of Turkistan, The soil in Western Afghanistan 

 and in Eastern Khorasan is not favourable for the production 

 of a good fibre, owing to the want of loam. Almost the 

 whole of the cotton grown is expended in the manufacture of 

 home-made material for local use. Elax, Linum usitatissimum, 

 is rarely grown, and when it is, as in Turkistan, it is for its 

 seed alone for oil, and not for fibre. In Turkistan a fibre, 

 for rope, is made by steeping in water the refuse stems of 

 Cannabis sativa. From Apocynum venetum is collected a 

 fine fibre which in these parts is chiefly manufactured into 

 rope or twine, but in Turkistan a kind of linen is made from 

 it. Here no use is made of the fibre of Erianthus Eavenn^, 

 but in Turkistan they make rope from it, and cultivate the 

 plant along the margins of their fields for this purpose. The 

 people here, when requiring a piece of twine, and certain of 

 the Astragali are handy, pull up their roots, and from the 

 bast and bark of the roots make what twine they may 

 require, or employ the bark from the young shoots of an Elm, 

 as they do in Kashmir and Southern Afghanistan. 



Ficus Carica, Linn. Urticace^. 



The Fig. The cultivated fig, anjir ; the indigenous fig, 

 anjir-i-hohl. The fig is cultivated in all the better class of 

 orchards, and the fruit is eaten in a fresh state. I do not 

 remember ever seeing any dried figs in any of the village 

 shops. The indigenous shrub I first met with at Tirpul, on 

 the face of some sandstone rocks, growing amongst the clefts, 

 where a very little water percolated. It was in great 

 luxuriance on the southern exposure of Sim-koh, forming a 

 good-sized shrub from eight to ten feet high, growing very 

 characteristically on, as it were, projecting mounds of soil, and 

 each bush was made up of numerous close-set shoots from 

 one general great root-stock. At Kush-ao, in Khorasan, on 

 the 20th August I saw several bushes, which were more 

 spreading and woody than those at Sim-koh. Near Kush-ao 

 the bushes were said to be very numerous, both on the plains 

 in the open and in the clefts of rocks ; where they exist 



