306 THE BASIN OF EASTERN PERSIA AND SISTAN. 
an Afghan prophecy, a great battle will some day take place between the English 
and the Russians, is now inhabited only by nomads, althongh this has by no means 
always been the case. Yate (p. ii) " found the plain covered with the marks of old 
karezes, or underground water-channels, and it had evidently been thickly populated 
by a culti\ating cla^s at some time, while water was said to be obtained all over it. 
When I passed it was all a waste." Ferrier, in the same region, describes the ruins 
of city after city. To a certain extent these might be restored to prosperity under 
good government, but there are certain places which no amount of government, 
good or bad, could affect. 
NEH. 
The ruins of Neh, called Kala Shah Duzd, or the Castle of King Thief, illustrate 
this point admirably. They are located 60 miles west of the northern end of the 
lake of Sistan. They have been described by Sykes (p. 413), who says : 
"Neh ... is undoubtedly a site of great antiquity, and must have been a place of impor- 
tance. ... Art the present time nine routes radiate from the town. Ancient Neh . . . 
three miles to the east of the more modern fort, is built on a hill only accessible on the west side, 
and is carefully guarded by ... a line of ba&tioned wall. . . . Lying up the steep hill- 
side are thousands of houses, built of unihewn stone fitted together with mortar the summit 
being some six hundred feet above the plain. The other faces are perpendicular, but the water 
supply seemed insufficient, there being only tanks, so far as could be seen. The area covered was 
quite four acres, and these are certainly the most important ruins which I have examined in East- 
ern Persia." 
It seems to me that Sykes, who is usually very accurate, has overestimated the 
size and importance of the ruins. I estimated that there were at least 300 houses 
still standing, possibly 500, and there may have been as many more which have 
fallen. As to the paucity of the water-supply, these questions seem to be not 
whether there are cisterns enough, but how the cisterns were filled. I counted 
five large cisterns, all of them located near the top of the hill. One was located in 
the mouth of a small valley, where it might possibly be filled .several times in the 
year if the drainage from among the surrounding houses were allowed to pour into 
it. The others were placed at the very crest of the hill, where they were not only 
surrounded by houses, but had only the most limited drainage areas, so that the 
rainfall of a whole year under present conditions would hardly fill them, even if the 
drainage firom the streets were allowed to come in. If the place were simply a 
fortress we might suppose that water was laboriously carried up the steep hill from 
the plain 600 or 700 feet below and stored for time of need, although there is 
now no source of water within 2 or 3 miles. The number and pennanence of 
the houses and the fact that many of them lie outside the fortifications, even 
though there are open spaces inside, indicate that the place was a pennanent town. 
If the inhaljitants were agriculturists their fields must have been far away ; if they 
were artisans and tradesmen their number is surprisingly large in proportion to the 
present possibilities of the surrounding country. If the rainfall were greater there 
would be no difficulty in understanding the location of Kala Shah Duzd, for the 
cisterns could be filled, fields could be cultivated nearby, and the surrounding 
plains could support villages which would warrant the building of a large fortress 
and town. It is not absolutely impossible that such a place should grow up under 
