AFGHAN BOUNDARY COMMISSION. 175 



basis of this triangulation all the topography was executed, whether 

 by the Russian topographers on a comparatively large scale along 

 the Hue of the boundary, or by the British officers and sub-surveyors, 

 who not only took up their share of boundary topography, but 

 extended smaller scale geographical work over a vast area in Persia 

 and Afghanistan amounting altogether to over 110,000 square 

 miles. The scale adopted was usually four miles to the inch, 

 occasionally reduced to half that scale where the triangulation was 

 not close enough to furnish a sufficient number of points within the 

 limits of the plane-table. The plane-table was the ordinary Indian 

 service pattern of the largest size, 36 in. X 24 in. 



From Kala Fath northward to Lash-Jowain the narrow valley 

 of the Helmand afforded no extensive view east or west ; for 30 miles 

 villages are scarce, though Ibrahimabad and its neighbourhood 

 appeared to present a magnificent field for antiquarian research, 

 old seals, coins, and rings being brought to the camp for sale in 

 great numbers ; all this part of the Helmand valley having been 

 evidently thickly inhabited in early times. The eastern Hamun or 

 depression into which the Helmand flows presented a striking appear- 

 ance. The dark blue green of the surface was flecked with white 

 foam, and the miniature waves were driven shorewards before the 

 fierce intensely cold blast of the westerly winds. Reed islands broke 

 the level here and there, and myriads of duck rose from the banks 

 and islands and rotated over the surface of the swamp well out of 

 reach. The expanse of water, however, as seen in October 1884 

 was nothing to what it appeared to Mr. Merk in November 1885, 

 when the two swamps had united into a vast lake and spreading 

 themselves southwards had spilled their waters into the Grod-i-Zirreh 

 of Baluchistan.* 



Jowain, a collection of mud buildings dome-roofed and in good 

 repair, on the left bank of the Farah-Rud, and Lash, picturesquely 

 perched on the edge of the opposite cliffs overlooking the river, are 

 both marked specimens of the peculiar Perso-Afghan style of town, 

 which extends throughout the border to Herat and Kandahar. Rows 

 of mud-built huts with beehive roofs clustering confusedly round 

 the walls of a central half -ruined mud fort re-occur with monotonous 

 regularity. The substitution of flat roofs in some of the larger 



* Some particulars of Mr. Merk's journey are given at page 331 of the Proceedings 

 of the Eoval Geographical Society for 1886. 



