From the Indus to the Tigris

by H. W. Bellew

The valley is rich in crops, and covered with villages. Most of them are more or less depopulated, and the people have yet a month to wait before the growing corn will be ready for the sickle. Meanwhile, how many must perish! The town, which is said to contain five hundred houses, half of which are empty, is indescribably filthy, and swarms with beggars, many of whom are dying curled up on the dung-heaps obstructing the roads. Cold and starvation together must soon put an end to their sufferings, for the night air at this elevation of 5125 feet above the sea is chill and damp.

This town appears to occupy the site of some more ancient city. On an eminence in its midst, and at the foot of some low hills, we saw the ruins of some ancient temple of vast proportions and very solid build. Six round monolith pillars on a corniced basement still exist in position, and another lies prostrate before the pile. Each pillar, so far as I could see between the intervening houses, is of solid limestone, about twelve feet high and four feet diameter. Nobody could tell us anything about the history of this ruin.

19th June.—Kangawár to Sahnah, twenty-three miles. Departure, 3.45 A.M.—route south-west, by a good though stony road, winding up and down between hills all the way, their slopes bare rock, but the skirts covered with a profusion of flowering plants, that perfume the air with their fragrance. Overtook several parties of travellers on their way to Kirmánshah. They had been waiting for several days for a caravan, and took advantage of my arrival to proceed with my party. They kept with us all the way, but held themselves aloof from our people at each stage.

At half-way we came to the Kotal Sahnah or “Pass of Sahnah.” Its top is called Gardan Búmsúrkh, or the “red-earthed ridge,” from the colour of the soil. Its elevation is 5800 feet above the sea. Here our course changed to due west, and the descent at four miles brought us to the spring and hamlet of Sarab, the first water met from Kangawár. At six miles farther, we reached Sahnah, and finding its post-house in ruins and its sarae yet incomplete, were glad to pass on from the scenes of its misery to a garden on the outskirts, where we camped under the shade of some magnificent elm-trees. Around us are vineyards and corn crops, the latter ripe and being cut.

On our way through the town, we passed several beggars lying in the streets, and moaning pitifully. During the day we have seen at least sixty poor wretches, mostly women and half-grown youths, who cannot live another month, I should say, even if they were now provided with food, to such a state of bloodless dropsy are they reduced. All the afternoon, tattered famished wretches hovered around our camp. Amongst them, in strange contrast, appeared a gaily-dressed, active, and rather good-looking young wench, with bare legs and short petticoats not reaching to the knees. A loose open shift of gauze showed a tattooed bosom and full stomach, whilst her painted cheeks and saucy bearing advertised her calling.

Some villagers who brought our supplies into camp gave us harrowing details of the sufferings this village had passed through. “This vineyard is full of the skeletons,” said one of them, “of those who have died here eating the leaves and shoots of the vines.” “Come,” he added, “I will show you some of them.” And at less than thirty paces from where I was seated at my table, he showed me three human skeletons. I saw several others farther in amongst the vines, and took advantage of the opportunity to secure a skull. But none of them being fit to take away, I asked my guide to fetch me a clean and perfect one. He disappeared over the wall into the next vineyard, and in less than as many minutes returned bearing three skulls in his arms. I selected one, and the others he tossed back amongst the vines we had just left. He told me this village formerly had two hundred and twenty families, but that not one hundred of them now remained.

20th June.—Sahnah to Besitun, eighteen miles. Night cold, clear, and moonlight—morning air delightful and fresh—midday sun hot. Departure, three A.M.—route west for two miles to foot of hills, and then south-west through a fertile valley along the course of the Lolofar river. The country is crossed by numerous irrigation streams, dotted with many villages, covered with corn crops, and fragrant with the perfume of multitudes of pretty flowers.

At the spring-head of Besitun I dismounted, and climbed over the rocks to look at the wonderful sculptures rescued from their obscurity and set before the world by Rawlinson, and then proceeded to the village, hardly five minutes off. The village is a miserable collection of forty or fifty huts close to a large sarae. As we passed the latter on our way to the post-house, a great wolfish shaggy dog stalked by, head erect, with the leg and foot of a woman held between his jaws. Some villagers staring at our party did not even take up a stone to hurl at the brute. We found the post-house so filthy, and after being swept, sprinkled with water, and carpeted, so unbearably foul-smelling, that we were obliged to quit it. A corpse lying at the door of the sarae turned us away from that too, and we went off to the turfy bank of a little stream hard by, and there awaited the arrival of our tents and baggage. The midday sun shone with considerable force, and the plague of flies and musquitoes was most annoying. A number of diminutive goats panting in the sun’s rays sought shelter in our tents from their worry and stings.

In different parts of our journey we had fared on what bread the places respectively produced, and took it, good, bad, and indifferent, as it came. But here the stuff they brought us was simply uneatable, so black, gritty, and musty was it. Even our servants refused to eat it, and we did very well without, aided by the disgust the horrid sights we had witnessed of themselves produced. An intelligent-looking Persian of this place came up to me at sunset, when our tents were being struck, and to my surprise addressed me in very good Hindustani. I learned from him that he was a Wahabi, and had recently returned from Dacca, where he had resided two years in the service of a wealthy merchant of that place. He told me there were no people left in this place except ten or twelve families of shopkeepers, who kept a small stock of supplies for wayfarers at the sarae.