FOOTNOTES:
[5] Charvadar—Caravan man.
CHAPTER XXXVII
Bambis—The Kashsan-Yezd high road—The Kevir plain—Minerals—Chanoh—Sand deposits—Sherawat—Kanats—Agdah—Stone cairns—Kiafteh—An isolated mount—A long sand bar—A forsaken village—Picturesque Biddeh—Handsome caravanserai at Meiboh—Rare baths—Shamsi—Sand-hills—Hodjatabad—Fuel—A "tower of silence"—A split camel—Thousands of borings for water—A four-towered well.
We left Bambis at ten o'clock on Sunday evening and travelled on a flat plain the whole night. One village (Arakan) was passed, and eventually we entered the Teheran-Kashan-Yezd high road which we struck at Nao Gombes. Here there were a Chappar Khana and an ancient Caravanserai—the latter said to be of the time of Shah Abbas—but we did not stop, and continued our journey along a broad, immense stretch of flat country consisting of sand and gravel.
My men were fast asleep on their mules, but the animals seemed to know their way well, as they had been on this road many times before. The night was extremely cold. We were now at an altitude of 4,240 feet in what is called the "Kevir," a small salt desert plain, enclosed to the south-west of the track by the south-easterly continuation of the Sara and Keble range; to the north-east by the Mehradji, Turkemani, and Duldul mountains; and to the north by the Aparek and Abiane mountains.
During the rainy weather the drainage of the latter two ranges is carried in large volumes into the plain between them, and eventually into the Kevir, in which it loses itself. To the south-east the Ardakan mountains form a barrier, having, however, a gap between them and the Andjile mountains, through which the road crosses in a south-easterly direction.
Antimony is found in the Mehradji mountains, and copper, lead (in several localities), nickel and antimony in the Anarek region. Silver is said to have been found in the Andjile. To the north-east, almost in the middle of the Kevir, stands the isolated high mountain of Siakuh.