610 Notes on Geology and Mineralogy of Affghanistan. 



cots, plumbs and cherries, pomegranates, pears, figs, and 

 grapes of delicious flavour and large size ; melons too are 

 abundant, and the whole view is one of great and striking 

 beauty. Through the midst of this green strip rushes the 

 rapid river, split into numerous channels, and generally 

 of good breadth ; but beyond the immediate influence of the 

 stream the valley again becomes a barren stony plain, stretch- 

 ing away for miles towards a range of volcanic hills, which 

 bound it on the West. From the left bank of the river 

 numerous canals are cut, by which the water is conducted 

 through breaks in the limestone range, into the valley of 

 Candahar, which is thus rendered fertile, but which, as it 

 furnishes no water of its own, would necessarily, without this 

 aid, remain for ever waste land. Again on the road to Cabul, 

 fine crops are sometimes met with to break the dreary 

 monotony of the stony plains, but are generally confined to the 

 immediate banks of the Turnuk, whose waters are subsequent- 

 ly lost before they can effect a junction with the Doree. 



In other parts where there are no streams at all, the 

 method adopted to procure water for irrigation, is to sink 

 a deep well on the higher lands near the hills, until the 

 water stratum is reached ; a second well is then sunk lower 

 down at a little distance from the first, and the two are con- 

 nected by boring a subterranean communication through 

 which, as the water rises into the first, it is conducted into 

 the second, and from it into a third, and so on until it is 

 carried from the base of the hills towards the lower and 

 distant cultivable lands, on which it debouches at the sur- 

 face. By this means a stream is raised, on the principle of 

 Artesian wells, from a deep-seated stratum, whose dip from 

 the hills would otherwise prevent the water from coming to 

 the surface, and large tracts of land, which are now rendered 

 exceedingly rich and fertile, would otherwise remain for ever 

 desolate and waste. 



