From the Indus to the Tigris

by H. W. Bellew

The general aspect of this tableland, bounded on all sides by hills, is singularly wild, and at this season its climate is bleak and inhospitable. A cold north wind swept down from the hills in numbing blasts, and howled over the wide waste dismally. Beyond the three little castellated hamlets in our vicinity, not a vestige of habitation or cultivation was anywhere to be seen. Yet in summer, we were assured, the now deserted pastures are covered with nomad tents, and swarm with teeming flocks of goats and sheep and camels.

Mahiabad, like Bújdí and Ishkambár, is a collection of eighteen or twenty miserable huts, protected by a small castle. Like them, too, it is almost depopulated by the effects of the famine, which still presses sorely, notwithstanding the imports of grain from Sistan. In Mahiabad, only four families are left out of its original population of fifteen families. The rest have either died of starvation, or emigrated in search of food. The remnant who still cling to the village are miserably poor, and carry starvation depicted on their features. Their lot now is undoubtedly a cruelly hard one, and in the best of times, could not have been a very favourable one, for the soil is sterile, and composed for the most part of the débris of trap and granite rocks, that strew the surface with sharp angular stones; whilst the water supply, which is from a pool fed by a kárez, is so bitter and saline that it is barely drinkable. We tried some tea prepared with it, and that was all, for it was impossible to drink it even thus disguised.

On the plain opposite Mahiabad, and a little distance from Bújdí, is a singular conical hill called márkoh, or “serpent hill.” It looks like a volcanic crater, and stands out alone by itself. We could not learn that the name had any reference to the existence or not of snakes upon it. Beyond Mahiabad our path entered the hills, and followed the windings of a wildly picturesque defile, the general direction of which is northerly. On our way up the gorge, which widens and narrows alternately, we passed the castellated hamlets of Pisukh and Piranj, each occupying an eminence overlooking the road, and at about the fifth mile reached the watershed, at a narrow pass called Gudar Saman Shahí. Its elevation is about 7020 feet above the sea, and 2140 feet above Birjand. The ascent is considerable all the way, and the road very rough, with sharp angular blocks of trap strewing the surface. Here and there the hard rugged rocks approach and narrow the path, so as to render it difficult for the passage of laden cattle. In the pass we overtook our baggage, which had left camp at Birjand at ten A.M., and it did not all arrive in our camp at Ghíbk till past nine P.M., the cattle being much exhausted by the march.

Beyond the watershed, the road slopes gently to a little dell full of vineyards, orchards, and fruit gardens; and farther on, crossing a deep boulder-strewn ravine, passes over a flat ridge of slaty rock down to the glen of Ghíbk, in which we camped at a few hundred yards below the village, a strip of terraced corn-fields intervening. This is the roughest and most difficult pass we have seen in all our journey so far; and it was the more trying both to man and beast by the inclemency of the weather. A cold north wind blew down the pass in chilling gusts, and at six o’clock, just as we had alighted on our camping-ground, a heavy storm of rain broke over us and drenched everything, so that it was with difficulty we got a fire lighted to warm ourselves till the arrival of our baggage, which did not all come up till three hours later, owing to the men having lost the path in the dark.

We halted here the next day to rest our cattle, and were so fortunate as to have fine weather, with a delightfully clear and fresh atmosphere, which enabled us thoroughly to enjoy and appreciate the climate and scenery of this really charming little eyrie in the hills, of which our first experience was so unfavourable. Our camp is pitched at the bottom of a narrow dell half a mile due west of Ghíbk, which is a romantic little village picturesquely perched on the summit and slopes of a mound at its top. From the midst of the huts, rising tier above tier, stands out their protecting castle, now in a sad state of decay, as indeed is the whole village. Around it are crowded together vineyards and fruit gardens on the terraced slopes of the hills, whilst the dell itself is laid out in a succession of terraced corn-fields, freely watered by sprightly little streams.

The situation is a charming one in this wild region of barren hills and rugged rocks, and in summer must be as agreeable and salubrious a residence as in winter it is bleak and inhospitable. The elevation of our camp at the bottom of the dell is estimated at 6650 feet above the sea, and that of the village itself about a couple of hundred feet higher. In winter, snow falls here very heavily, and the people are shut up in their houses for fully two months. The main range of mountains rises several hundred feet above the elevation of Ghíbk, and runs from north-west to south-east, throwing out spurs on either side, that enclose a succession of glens or narrow valleys draining east and west. The Ghíbk valley is one of these, and is continuous towards the west, through the gully of the ravine we crossed on approaching it, with the glens of Arwí and Zarwí, the drainage of which ultimately reaches the Khusp river, to be lost on the sandy desert of Yazd. The main range has different names to distinguish its several portions; thus at Ghíbk it is called Alghór or Arghol, to the north of this it is called Sághí, and to the south Saman Shahí. The Alghór range gives its name to one of the principal divisions or bulúk of the Gháyn district.

The Alghór bulúk is said to contain upwards of three hundred villages and hamlets and farmsteads (mazrá), scattered about in nooks and dells amongst the hills. Arwí and Zarwí are amongst the largest of the villages. We visited these during our halt here. They are very picturesquely situated in adjoining dells only two or three miles off, and each contains about two hundred houses. They have a neat and prosperous look, and are surrounded by vineyards and orchards and small patches of corn cultivation. Ghíbk is a smaller village, and contains about seventy or eighty houses. Alghór is the chief town of the bulúk, and is said to contain three hundred houses. It is the residence of the agent of the governor of the district, Mír ’Alam Khán. All these villages have suffered more or less severely during the famine, and some have become entirely depopulated. The population of Ghíbk was formerly nearly four hundred souls. It now only contains about two hundred and fifty. During last year fifty-three persons, we were told, had died of starvation, and the village has further lost thirty families who have emigrated to Sistan.

From Ghíbk we marched eighteen miles, and camped at Sihdih. Our route was generally north by west, up the course of a drainage gully, winding amongst hills, and passing from dell to dell up to a watershed formed by a spur from the Sághí range on our right. It runs east and west, and is about 6750 feet above the sea. The hills are of disintegrated trap overlaid by a soft friable slate, the surface of which has crumbled into a marly soil. Vegetation, though there are no trees nor large bushes, except in the gardens, is more abundant than the wild and rugged look of the hills would lead one to expect. We noticed camel-thorn, ephedra, asafœtida, rhubarb, wormwood, tulip, crocus, bluebell, and other similar plants and grasses, along the line of march.

Beyond the watershed the road slopes gently along the course of a long drainage gully, which winds through a gradually widening country with hills on either side, and at about twelve miles enters the Sihdih valley, an open plateau extending east and west for thirty miles or so. In the first few miles from the watershed we passed in succession the villages of Nokhán, Cháhikan, and Pistakhan on the left, and Sághí and Husenabad on the right. The country between the hills is much broken by low mounds, all more or less ploughed up and sown with corn. The extent of this cultivation indicates the existence of a much larger population than we see in our passage through the country. The fact is, they are concealed from view in the secluded nooks and glens of the hills around, each of which has its own farmsteads and hamlets, with their vineyards and fruit gardens. The fruits produced here are the plum, apricot, jujube, apple, peach, quince, almond, mulberry, &c. The chief crops are wheat and barley, and the common vegetables are the carrot, turnip, onion, cabbage, beet, &c. In summer the hill pastures are resorted to by nomads with their flocks of goats and sheep and herds of camels. Snow still lies on the higher ranges, and patches are found in the sheltered hollows lower down. The hills abound in game, such as the márkhor and ibix (both species of wild goat), and the wild sheep. The leopard, hyæna, and wolf are also found on them, but not the bear. The country generally is devoid of trees, but supports an abundant growth of pasture plants and bushes suitable for fuel. We here found the surface covered with the wormwood, and a dwarf yellow rose with a dark purple centre. It is called khalora, and affords a good pasture for cattle. I observed it all over the country as far west as Kirmánshah, and generally in company with the wild liquorice.