454 



NATURE 



{Sept. II, 1879 



veyed was restricted to the province of Khorassan. But 

 the whole of the Iranian table-land was actually crossed 

 from Bushire, on the Persian Gulf, through Shiraz and 

 Yezd, in a north-easterly direction, to the Afghan frontier. 

 Here it was the traveller's intention to break fresh ground 

 by penetrating from Herat along the Hari-rud valley, and 

 through Bamian, direct to Kabul. But this scheme, which 

 would have opened up an entirely new region, was 

 thwarted at the outset by two insurmountable difficulties. 



The immediate consequence was that instead of an able 

 and much-needed work on the Perso-Afghan highlands, 

 we have one limited mainly to the north-eastern districts 

 of Persia. On this region much additional light is thrown, 

 and an attempt is made to remove the obscurity still 

 attaching to the water-system of the country between the 

 Bakharz and Chain ranges. " The drainage of the space 

 between the northern face of the Doroh hills, the eastern 

 slope of the Chain range, and the southern side of the 

 Khaf range, I believe to be as follows : — First, it does not 

 enter the Hari-rud by the Karat-rud, cutting the Dushakh 

 ridge, as is shown in our maps, nor does it drain to the 

 Harflt-rud, or to the Hari-rud direct. All the drainage of 

 this space is absorbed into three great depressions, called 

 ' daks,' that is, the drainage of Niboluk, of Chain, and of 

 Khaf Pains, goes to the Dak-i-Diwalan ; that of the 

 Zirkoh tract, which includes all to the east of the Auguran 

 range, including Gulwarden, Yezdun, and Kaland, drains 

 into the Dak-i-Khurshab, close to the Koh Kabuda ; while 

 that of Furg, Daramian, Ahwaz, &c., drains to the Dak-i- 

 Tundi, fifteen farsakhs from Ahwaz, and a portion from 

 Mogulbackhe to Pahre runs direct into the Hari-rud. This 

 may seem at first sight a rather startling statement, but it 

 is not so in reality. In the first place, it must be remem- 

 bered that the process of denudation of the surrounding 

 hiUs, which is constantly going on, must have a tendency to 

 create the low ridges which cause these depressions ; and 

 as there is not sufficient water to keep a way open for 

 itself, and, moreover, the soil is salt, what there is is 

 rapidly evaporated and sucked in, and it is easy to see how 

 these drainage beds have lost the power of discharging 

 themselves to what, no doubt, should be their proper 

 exit, the Hari-rud " (vol. i. p. 204). 



Elsewhere some useful information is given regarding 

 the "kavirs," "rigs," "liits," and "beyabuns," which oc- 

 cupy such a large portion of the Iranian tableland ; but 

 the existence is denied of one continuous " kavir " (salt 

 desert) stretching from Kflm to Bejistun, though " there 

 are a great number of smaller kavirs due to local drain- 

 age" ^ (vol.ii. p. 138). A graphic description is given at 

 p. loi, vol. i., of one of these dreary kavirs twelve miles 

 long on the route between Kiir and Tabaz. " It is rather 

 difficult to suggest anything that will give an English 

 reader an idea of what this kavir is. It is not sand, nor 

 is it in the least hke the desolate plains of India, which, 

 burnt up as they may be, are luxuriant in their vegetation 

 compared with kavir. It has, speaking quite literally, 

 not one blade of grass, nor one leaf of any kind, not a 

 living thing of any sort. It is composed of dark soil, 



^ Originally kavir, or rather kahir, was an adjective, simply meaning 

 threat, the full expression being Darya-i-kabtr, *' the great ocean,'* i.e. , of 

 salt, and it may be added that, notwithstanding Col. MacGregor's view, the 

 natives invariably apply this expression collectively to the whole of the vast 

 region stretching from the Ghain highlands westwards to Yeid and Kashan. 

 Further north this salt waste would seem to intersect the Chain range west and 

 cast, here merging with the Khaf Desert, which joins the Dashti Na-ummed 

 " desert of despair ") on the south, aod the Ghorian wastes on the east. 



which looks as if it had been turned up by the plough 

 a year before, but which is covered with a thick salt 

 efflorescence, which gUtters painfully to the eyes. All 

 round, as far as the eye can reach, there is nothing to 

 be seen but this glare of white, which seems to stare 

 piteously on you as you pass by, crunching over its dry 

 crust. Every here and there is a dark patch, which, on 

 getting up to, you find to consist of moist earth which 

 seems, as it were, to have sweated up from beneath. 

 These patches also dry up, and then the salt shows. 

 The surface of the kavir is not smooth, but is so honey- 

 combed with small holes about nine inches deep and the 

 size of a man's head, that it is very difficult walking for 

 animals ; but as the soil of the kavir binds very well, a 

 good road could doubtless be made over it." 



Altogether, what with kavirs, stony wastes, rough roads, 

 brackish water, filthy serais with little accommodation 

 beyond foul air and noxious vermin, it is not astonishing 

 to learn that the writer did not find travelling in Persia 

 much more pleasant than others have done before him, 

 and it is depressing to hear that there is little prospect ot 

 any improvement in the future. " The worst of this 

 country is that, bad as it is, one cannot conceive how it 

 could be improved in any single way. There is no water, 

 it produces absolutely nothing, and there is no possibility 

 of water being collected for irrigation" (vol. i. p. 84). 

 Worse still, the sands are in many places visibly gaining 

 on the arable land, and even on the inclosed cities them- 

 selves. "The country is, in fact, in the process of 

 changing from a series of rocky ridges to one of undu- 

 lating sandy wastes. Yesterday's march showed the sand 

 triumphant ; to-day the rocks are still fighting on. This 

 process of burying is most peculiar, and may be wit- 

 nessed on a small scale in almost any village between this 

 and Yezd. You see the sand blown against the wall, 

 gradually getting higher and higher, till it blows over and 

 then forms a mound in the field beyond, which gradually 

 increases its height till all trace of wall and field is lost, 

 and you have before you a sand-heap. I can quite be- 

 lieve now the stories of towns being buried, having myself 

 seen the thing on a small scale" (vol. i. p. 147). 



In the caravanserai of Bandar Gaz on the Caspian, 

 acquaintance was made with what would appear to be " a 

 new specimen," which may interest entomologists. "It 

 had a head all made up of eyes, a body like an ordinary 

 fly, and a tail like a gimlet. It never made any noise, 

 and it always attacked to the rear, and once it had got its 

 gimlet into you, it seemed to afford it such pleasure that 

 it invariably parted with its life sooner than let go. But 

 its effects were not realised till after death ; then came on 

 an itching pain that nearly drove one mad" (vol. ii. 

 p. 166). 



In case a second edition should be required of this 

 work, attention may be directed to the peculiar spelling 

 of proper names, with a view to introducing some kind of 

 law and order where all is now sheer chaos. It would 

 probably be too much to hope for a uniform adherence 

 to some scientific or at least intelligent system of trans- 

 literation ; but a moderate degree of consistency might 

 at least be expected from a writer who has some know- 

 ledge of the Arabo-Persian writing system. But here we 

 have neither consistency, nor uniformity, nor anything 

 but the wildest confusion, and the accompanying map at 



