PERSEPOLIS TO ISPAHAN. 
151 
a large place; but on a nearer inspection the town exhibits only a great 
extent of ruined walls without inhabitants. The present population is 
all enclosed within a square fort, the walls, indeed, of which were 
crowded by women, whose white veils made them conspicuous objects 
even at a distance. The fort itself is defended by a turret at each 
angle, and three in each of the intervening sides. I walked into it to 
look at a bath, the most respectable building in the place; for the rest 
consists only of miserable walls of mud or brick. Yet in the rudest 
wall we found a well-formed arch, which the want of timber has taught 
the people to construct, and the same necessity has forced the same 
lesson on other parts of the country. 
The property and jurisdiction of Abadeh , SurmeJc, and Shoolgistoon , 
with their intervening territories, belong by purchase to one man. Yet 
the scarcity of water in the district must render it an unprofitable 
estate. AbadSh, however, is surrounded by gardens, from which some 
very good fruit is sent to Shiraz; but the irrigation is all carried by 
artificial kanauts . 
25 th. The clouds which, on the preceding day, had sprinkled a few 
flakes of snow on our tract, and had threatened a heavy fall, rolled off 
before day-break, and opened to us one of the most brilliant mornings 
in nature. The mountains were no longer concealed from our view; 
the snow, indeed, covered their summits, and impregnated every blast 
of wind with a piercing but invigorating freshness. We proceeded 
along the same plain, on a bearing which averaged N. 29 W. The high 
lands on each side, now advancing, now receding from us, continued 
their N. and S. direction; and, where the snow had not covered their 
surfaces, presented that hard and forbidding aspect which indicated the 
minerals below.* The soil on the plain still was gravel lightly mixed 
—-the rest entire, 
Shone with a glossy scurf, undoubted sign, 
That in his womb was hid metallic ore 
The work of sulphur. Par. Lost, I. 670, 
