170 
Variation in the Price and Supply of Wheat. 
and in past times was famed for its salubrity. At the present 
time fever, diarrhoea, and dysentery are more or less prevalent 
according to the proximity of the extensive marshes which form 
the peculiar features of the extensive tract of country through 
which the Euphrates winds by more than one channel. In dry 
seasons the great river is swallowed up by these marshes. The 
obstacles to industry are the wretched social condition of the 
inhabitants and the general insecurity arising from the weakness 
of the administration, the power of the Arab chiefs, and their 
constant dissensions. The predatory tribes of Arabs, in the dis- 
tricts most frequented by them, wander about the great plains 
and make them dangerous and inaccessible to honest settlers. 
Four-fifths of the land is the property of the crown, and is let in 
large parcels and sublet on a vicious principle, without security 
of tenure. Works of irrigation are consequently everywhere pre- 
cluded. The fellahs, or peasant proprietors, and farmers, are 
universally in debt. 
The crown lands are devoted to cereal produce ; the private 
lands and life grants consist for the most part of date-plantations, 
orchards, and kitchen-gardens. The implements of farming are 
the plough, the spade, and the hoe. Corn is trodden out by oxen, 
and water for irrigation is raised from the river by skins drawn 
over a roller by oxen, or horses, working up and down a ramp. 
The price of wheat varies according to locality and distance 
from the towns. The average for the last five years at Bagdad 
was 29s. a quarter. In 1863 it was 40s. 
North of the province of Bagdad are Diarbekr, Kurdistan, 
and the northern provinces. These are rich in natural resources ; 
the rich valleys and well-watered plateaux are sheltered by the 
mountains of Armenia, and watered by the Tigris and numerous 
other rivers. The rivers never fail, and they abound in fish. 
The climate is equable and agreeable, free from extremes of heat 
and cold, and healthy to Europeans. The plains and uplands 
are rich in pasturage throughout the year, and consequently 
they are superior beyond comparison to the arid sheep runs of 
Australia. The arable land is equally fertile in corn and native 
fruits. Luscious sultana grapes, equal to those of Smyrna, peaches, 
and plums, the largest and finest flavoured in the world, grow in 
profusion in the northern districts. Nuts, walnuts, almonds, 
pistachio nuts, and button nuts thrive everywhere in the upper 
provinces. This would be a land of fruits, preserves, and sweet- 
meats, as well as of corn and wool and cotton, if the inhabitants 
possessed skill and industry. But the cultivation is the laziest 
that can be conceived. The cotton might rival that of any other 
country in price and quality if careful cultivation and Arab 
tribes could co-exist in the same land. These erratic traders 
