As neither law nor custom forbids the manufacture of wine by non-Mohammedans, the cultivation of the grape spreads, and the making of wine increases. From this it may be inferred, as there is little export of wine from Persia, that all the produce is not consumed by non-Mohammedans. As a matter of fact, the religious law which forbids wine to Mohammedans is not rigidly observed; in truth, they are not all total abstainers, and the delightful poison, as chronicled by Moulla Akbar, is known to be a convenient remedy for all manner of moods, ills, and complaints, nervous, imaginary, and real. They have been described as drinking well when they do break the religious law, for they have a saying that 'there is as much sin in a glass as in a flagon.' The Persians have never thoroughly accommodated themselves to the creed of their Semitic conquerors; they show profound respect for the externals of Mohammedanism, and are sincere in their practice of piety and the obligations of religion and charity; but they have always indulged in the fancies and ideas of the great school of free-thinking philosopher Sofis, whose observance of the ordinances of severe and joyless life is notedly lax.
The weather was lovely as we journeyed over the Kasvin plain to Tehran, towards the end of September. Autumn in the North of Persia is a gloriously fine season, almost spring-like in many ways, and, indeed, it is called there the 'second spring.' The landscape then, though nearly barren of verdure, has a beauty of its own in warm soft colours, and the atmospheric effects on the hills and distances, evening and morning, are of wonderfully delicate tones and tints. The prominent feature in the landscape near Tehran is the grand cone-shaped Mount Demavend, about forty miles to the north-east, which shoots up 19,400 feet above ocean-level, and overtops all the surrounding heights by 6,000 feet or more. It stood out bold, cold, and clear against the blue sky, and looked beautifully white with a fresh covering of new snow, and it was more than usually distinct, from being clear of the cloud-crown it usually wears. In the evening the massive peak presented a splendid appearance, looking as in a white heat from the shine of the setting sun, which, though lost to view below the horizon, yet lighted up the old volcano.
Demavend has long been asleep, but the great earthquakes of 1891, 1893 and 1895 in Astrabad and Kuchan to the eastward, and Khalkhal in the north-west, show that its underground fires are still alight. The scene of the last is about one hundred miles north-east of the old volcanic region of Afshar, remarkable for its remains of vast 'cinter' cones, formed by the flowing geysers of long, long ago, and which were shattered and scattered by some mighty explosion, when the great geysers boiled up and burst their walls. Here is seen the Takht-i-Sulimân, a ruined fort of very ancient date, which local tradition describes as one of King Solomon's royal residences, shared by his Queen, Belghéiz (of Sheba), whose summer throne is also shown on a mountain height above. This ruin incloses a flowing geyser of tepid sea-green water, about 170 feet deep, the temperature of which was 66° when I visited the place in 1892. Near it is the Zindân-i-Sulimân (Solomon's Dungeon), an extinct geyser, 350 feet deep. It shows as a massive 'cinter' cone, 440 feet high, standing prominently up in the plain. This district was visited and fully described by the late Sir Henry Rawlinson, and a further account of it has been given by Mr. Theodore Bent, who, with Mrs. Bent, went there in 1889.
The volcanic district of Afshar has long been known for its quicksilver, which from time to time has been found in small quantities. Some seven or eight hundred years ago Arab miners laboured long in their search for the main cinnabar vein which undoubtedly lies hidden there, and their wide workings in laying open a whole hillside, where signs of cinnabar are still seen, show what great gangs of labourers they must have had at their command. The Persian Mines Corporation in 1891-92 engaged in operations at the same point, but, after considerable sinking of shafts and driving of galleries into the heart of the hill, they decided to cease work, being disappointed, like their Arab predecessors, in not finding quickly what they had traced by clear signs up to its mountain source. A few miles below the site of these cinnabar-mine operations there are ancient gold-washing workings, and within thirty miles are heavy veins of quartz.
Tehran displays a marked advance in many of the resources of civilization; houses of an improved style are springing up, the roadways are better attended to, and there is a great increase in the number of carriages. The Prime Minister's new house, near the British Legation, is situated in beautiful gardens, set off with pretty lakelets and terraced grounds, which give slopes for flowing waterfalls. These gardens, in common with all in the town, are tenanted every year by nightingales of sweet song. It is now proposed to enclose an adjoining available space to form a people's park, which would be a great place of enjoyment in summer to a people of poetic imagination like the Persians, who delight in the green glade with the cool sound of flowing water. The severe cholera epidemic of 1892 showed the absolute necessity of an improvement in the rude sanitary system which then existed, and a beginning has been made in the daily careful cleaning of the streets and removal of refuse. But a better and increased water-supply is greatly needed for the town, which is becoming larger every year. People who have money to spend appear to be attracted more than ever to the capital. Those who before were content with the provincial towns now build houses in Tehran. The superior houses have garden-ground attached, and much tree-planting is done. The demand for water increases, but the supply is not supplemented. Years ago the utmost was made of the sources from which water is drawn; no pains have been spared to extract every possible drop of water from the heart of the hills within a considerable distance, and to convey it undiminished by evaporation to the city. This is done by underground channels called kanats, which are excavated with great ingenuity and skill, and are marvels of industry. This system prevails all over Persia, and existence as well as the fertility of the soil mainly depends on the water-supply thus obtained. The sandy expanse round Yezd in the desert of South-eastern Persia has been made literally to blossom like the rose by means of these subterranean channels, some of which are tunnelled for a distance of thirty miles. I was there in spring-time, and was then able to see what a wonder-worker water is in Persia.
The pressing need of more water for Tehran has now drawn attention to the proposals of some years ago for increasing the supply. One of these was to divert to the south an affluent of the Upper Lar, which rises in the Elburz range, and flows into the Caspian. It was seen that this could be done by cutting a new channel and tunnelling from a point sufficiently high, where the stream runs in an elevated valley between the double ridge of the range. The work would have been similar, but simpler, to what was completed last year in Madras, where the upper Periyar stream was changed from a western to an eastern flow. The execution of the Lar project would be easy, and it would not practically affect the volume of water in the main stream, which receives many tributaries below the proposed point of piercing the watershed. But the Lar Valley was one of the Shah's summer retreats, and a favourite pasture-ground for his brood mares and young stock. It is, moreover, a popular resort of flock-owning nomads, and as the Shah's love of camp life there led him to fear injury to the grassy plains and slopes of his favourite highlands, the project was abandoned.
There was another scheme to construct a series of reservoirs by means of strong barriers at the foot of the lower ravines of the Elburz range, eight miles north of Tehran, in which to keep the winter water which comes from the melting snow. The whole mountain-chain is covered with snow each year from top to bottom. In April and May the snow melts, and the precious water flows away where it is not wanted. Were this water stored, it would be made available in the succeeding hot months. The sloping plain between the hills and the town is capable, with irrigation, of great fertility, and the construction of these reservoirs would prove a veritable gold-mine.
The distribution of water is a most important part of village administration in Persia. The work of cutting off and letting on water with most exact observance of time-measurements is carried out by a waterman called mirab (lord of the water) whose office is hereditary, subject, however, to the special judgment of popular opinion. The duties demand a clear head and nimble foot, and the waterman, in hastening from point to point, has to show all the alertness of a street lamplighter. He has to keep a correct count of time, for water is apportioned by the hour, and his memory for all the details of change, sale, and transfer must be good and unchallenged. When he becomes too old, or otherwise incapacitated for the performance of his work with the necessary quickness, he avails himself of the assistance of a son or someone whom he proposes with the village approval to bring up as his successor. The old man is then to be seen going leisurely along the water-courses which issue from the underground channels, accompanied by his young deputy carrying the long-handled Persian spade, ready to run and execute his orders. Disputes between village and village over kanat water-cuts form the subject of severe fights occasionally, and the saying is that water and women are the main causes of village quarrels in Persia.
It was a hot day in June, and having been up before daylight so as to start at earliest dawn and avoid the mid-day heat for my whole party, we were all in the enjoyment of afternoon sleep, when the courtyard was invaded by a shouting mob of excited villagers, calling on me to hear their story and bear witness to their wounds. They said they were the tenants of the landlord whose house I was occupying, and they begged me as his guest to make a statement of their case, so that justice might be done. There had been a dispute over an irrigation channel, and the opposing side having mustered strong, they were overpowered by numbers and badly beaten. Some of the hurts they had received were ugly to look at, having been inflicted with the long-handled Persian spade, the foot-flanges of which make it a dangerous weapon. After a patient hearing, and getting some plaster and simple dressing for their cuts and bruises, they went away satisfied. So much for water as a cause of quarrel, but an instance of the other cause, woman, which had come under my notice shortly before, was more seriously characteristic. It occurred at Shamsabad, on the border of the Aberkoh Desert, between Yezd and Shiraz. I halted there after the long night journey across the desert, and immediately I was settled in my village quarters, the master of the house in which I lodged asked me to look at the gunshot wounds of one of his young men, and to prescribe and provide in any way I could towards healing them. I asked if any bones were broken, saying that I could do little or nothing in such a case. I was told that they were but flesh wounds, and on the young man coming in, I was shown a ragged long cut between the lower ribs, and a deepish wound in the fleshy part of the leg, which had evidently been made by slugs or buckshot. I prescribed careful cleansing, and the use of lint and lotion, and I gave a supply of the necessary material. I asked how the thing had happened, and the young fellow told me that he and his brother had been treacherously attacked at a water-mill, whilst having the family grain ground, by some Aberkoh youths, between whose family and his there was a longstanding blood-feud; that they both had been shot at close quarters, and his brother had died of his wounds two days before.
The master of the house, who was also headman of the village, explained that the blood-feud had been carried on for five generations, and had originated in a 'little maid' who, being betrothed in their village, had eloped with a young man of Aberkoh. The disappointed bridegroom had afterwards taken his successful rival's life, and the deadly demand of a life for a life had, in accordance with the law of revenge, been made and exacted for the past five generations. He said the elders had hoped the quarrel was nearly dead, as there had been long peace between the parties, but suddenly the hot blood of youth had risen to renew it, and now there was fear of further murder. In that remote district the ancient first principles of natural justice had still strong hold upon the people, and formed, in the absence of established law, the defence of families and communities.