THE DERVISHES OF BOKHARA
The cultivated zone which lies around Bokhara and Kagan does not extend for any considerable distance beyond the immediate precincts of the capital of the Khanate. In running towards Merv the railway passes through a region where the water difficulty is perpetual. The waterless zone may be said to begin with Murgak, where water from the Zerafshan river is supplied in tanks by the railway. This system is also adopted for the next station, Yakatut, which although insignificant receives a comparatively important volume of trade. Irrigation is not encouraged and the water coming by the railway is very carefully distributed to a population that, including the large village of Yakatut and a few smaller hamlets, amounts in all to 3000 souls. The passenger traffic is small and the returns only record the import and export movement:
| Imports. | ||
| Cotton seed | 51,675 | poods. |
| Goods (various) | 3,615 | ” |
| Exports. | ||
| Wine grapes. | 9,555 | poods. |
| Goods (various) | 36,467 | ” |
Kara Kul follows as the line runs towards the south and 10 versts distant from it there is the native town of the same name. At one time the centre of a large and flourishing oasis, the drifting sands from the Kara Kum have encroached until it has been ruined and the total population of the region reduced to 5000 people. The place is watered by the Zerafshan, upon whose volume so much of the prosperity of Bokhara depends. This river, which was called by the ancients the Polytimaetus, takes its rise in the glaciers of the Kara mountains, 270 miles east of Samarkand. Its upper reaches resemble a succession of cataracts and it is altogether too shallow for navigation. The average width is 210 feet; more than 100 canals, some of which are 140 feet broad, are supplied from this source of Bokhara’s greatness. The capital of the Khanate is fed by one of them, called the Shari Rud, and over 35 feet in width. The river reaches its full volume during the winter and the spring. Three versts before Kara Kul, at a point where the stream breaks up into a series of small feeders, a wide bridge, 15 sagenes in length, affords passage to the railway.
In spite of diminishing importance Kara Kul still attracts and disperses a certain volume of trade, the movement showing:
| Passengers. | |
| Arrivals. | Departures. |
| 10,281 | 9442 |
| Imports. | Exports. |
| 305,749 poods. | 190,445 poods. |
the bulk of which is associated with the cotton factory of M. Levine and a distillery controlled by a French syndicate, the two properties being situated close to the station.
Beyond Kara Kul, as far as Khoja Davlet, there is a considerable area of cultivation. With this station the agricultural possibilities of the quarter, due in the main to irrigation by the waters of the Oxus, come to an end and the line begins to pass through the shifting sands of Sundukli. From this point, too, the growth of the saxaoul is promoted as a protection to the railway from the sand drifts. At Farab station, where the growth and cultivation of sand shrubs has been studied and where there is a special nursery covering 5 dessiatines, some little success in this direction has been attained. Unfortunately the moving sands are the great and ever present menace to the prosperity of this neighbourhood. In contrast with these outlying edges of the district where there is nothing but a waste of salt marshes and sand dunes, there is a wonderful wealth of vegetation along the banks of the river. The station workshops, where some eighty workmen are daily employed, the small hospital, the railway buildings and the technical school are embowered by trees of the most luxuriant growth. None the less Farab, although associated with the headquarters of the Oxus steamers, is too close to Charjui to be of much importance.