Wildfowl in Seistan 69 



ingenious, absolutely nothing but reeds (in the 

 vernacular tut) are used from stem to stern. 1 The 

 life of a tutin is not long, as they soon become 

 water-logged ; but as they only cost a few hours' 

 labour, this is not of much consequence. A grace- 

 ful girl propelling a punt is reputed to be one of 

 the most exhilarating sights on the river Thames. 

 A sayad in his tutin on the Hamun, with his long 

 but crooked pole, is probably somewhat less so ; but 

 still his muscular bronze figure, in the strenuous 

 attitudes his art demands, against a background 

 of blue water and sky, is undeniably picturesque. 



In Persian, the word sayad means simply 

 " hunter " ; but in Seistan the term has come to 

 be applied only to this aboriginal tribe of lake- 

 dwellers. They live, like the gaodars, in huts 

 made of reeds, but their occupations are netting 

 fish and wildfowl usually bartered for grain 

 and making mats. The fish I think a kind of 

 carp, not the Indian manseer they catch in a 

 triangular net. For wildfowl, they use a kind 

 of clap net. It is fixed across a channel connect- 



1 It is interesting to notice how, in like environments, evolution 

 proceeds on like lines. I was recently reading a French account 

 of the Lake Tchad area, and was much struck by the similarity of 

 the physical phenomena and problems of that part to those of the 

 Seistan basin. The boats used on the great African lake seemed 

 from the pictures to be almost identical in construction with the 

 tutins of the Hamun. 



