720 Sketch of the Physical Geography of Seistan. [No. 103. 



left, so that the animal was marked as if leeches had been applied to it ; 

 but this was all, and though every one said, " You have not seen the flies, 

 a cold night killed them just before you arrived, &c.," I began to suspect 

 that the reports I had heard on the subject were fabrications, or at least 

 exaggerations. I was mistaken : it was our last march in Seistan ; we 

 were approaching Chukhnasoor, and our road lay over some soil which 

 the water of the lake had lately left, and which was hard, dry, and broken 

 into innumerable small cracks : from these cracks such swarms of flies 

 issued, that I can only give an idea of their numbers, by comparing them, 

 to bees near a hive which has just been disturbed. They buzzed round our 

 faces, and bit us in every less protected part, as the ancle above the shoe, the 

 neck, &c. When we reached our halting ground. Peer i Risri, on the bank 

 of the river Khash, their numbers were incredible ; the horses were nearly 

 maddened, and the servants declared they would all be killed. We lighted 

 fires on the windward side of every horse, smothering the flame to make 

 the smoke rise : this was not sufficient ; we could not drive away the flies 

 from our own persons, and the heat was too great to allow of our covering 

 our faces with a cloth.^ On the opposite bank was a thick jungle of dry 

 reed, we set fire to it, and huge volumes of smoke driving over us, we 

 escaped our tormentors at the expense of sore eyes, and being blackened 

 with ashes. During the night, afraid to face another day here, we hurried 

 away to Ruddeh, glad to be quit of the flies and Seistan. 



The Seistan fly resembles the common fly, but is twice as large. In the 

 spring it is of a pale brown with dark spots ; as the year closes the colour 

 turns black, and soon after the insect dies. The bite is painful, but less 

 so than the sting of a wasp, and the pain is only momentary. 



To the annoying attacks of the flies, is generally attributed the re- 

 markable mortality which prevails among horses in 

 Seistan, and it is not improbable that the irritation 

 produced by their bites may have considerable effect in promoting the 

 evil. There is hardly a horse in the country. Of more than 5,000 brought 

 by Kamran in his expedition, about four years ago, not one is said to have 

 been alive six months after the return of the army to Herat. This is of 

 course a gross exaggeration, but there is no doubt that the loss was 

 immense. The few horses which the Seistan chiefs keep for state, are tended 

 with the greatest care in dark stables, from which they never issue, unless 

 on some important occasion, except during the winter. When brought out 

 their whole bodies are covered with cloth, particular care being taken to 

 protect the belly, for a bite in that part is considered fatal ; they are never 

 galloped, for it is believed that if a horse sweats, he is sure to die. I 

 bought a horse from a Belooch chief, which Rbohundil Khan of Candahar 



