REMARKABLE RUINS 



are built of coral rock ; the walls are nearly 3 feet 

 thick, and about 30 feet long. There is a door- 

 way in one of the houses, flanked by pillars, and this, 

 as well as the opening of the shrine, faces south. The 

 latter is a most curious ruin, and is covered with a 

 simple type of carving cut into the coral rock to a 

 depth of about a quarter of an inch. The entrance, 

 which is about 4 feet high, is arched, and at the top 

 the stone has been cut into the shape of an inverted 

 heart, while the walls on both sides are covered 

 with carving.^ The interior is smooth, apparently 

 plastered over, but the floor has crumbled away. To 

 the north of the houses I found a quantity of broken 

 but highly glazed pottery of a kind that is quite 

 unlike any manufactured by the natives to-day ; 

 especially interesting were some pieces of china, the 

 bottom of a stone ewer and a piece of glass that 

 would appear to have been the neck of a bottle or 

 flask. These ruins are so buried in the dense bush 

 that it would be easy to pass close by without seeing 

 them. I learned from Captain Salkeld and Dr. 

 Wilson that there are remains of a similar nature 

 on the Bajun Islands farther south, and the latter 

 was fortunate enough to obtain several unbroken 

 specimens of what seemed to be oil lamps, unmistak- 

 ably Persian in design. Repeated inquiries elicited 

 no information from the Somali as reo^ards the origin 

 of these ruins ; they said that they were in the same 

 condition when they entered the country ; the Galla 

 seemed to know no more. Captain Stigand, in his 

 book, The Land of Zinj, has given some very 

 interesting information concerning the ruins he 



^ Similar ornamentation occurs above the doorway of the old Persian 

 monastery of Lamu. 



58 



