Physical geography. By Mary Somerville ...

CHAP. III. CIIARACTER OF THE SOIL. 59
tains of Khorasan and the Paropamisan range, which appear to be
chains of mountains when viewed from the low plains of Khorasan
and Balkh, but on the table-land of Persia they merely form a broad
hilly country of rich soil, till they join the Hindoo Coosh.
The table-land of Iran is bounded for 1000 miles along the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean by a mountainous belt of from three to
seven parallel ranges, having an average width of 200 miles, and
extending from the extremity of the Kourdistan Mountains to the
mouth of the Indus. The Lasistan Mountains, which form the
northern part of this belt, and bound the vast level plain of the
Tigris, rise from it in a succession of high table-lands divided by
very rugged mountains, the last ridge of which, mostly covered with
snow, abuts on the table-land of Persia. Oaks clothe their flanks;
the valleys are of generous soil, verdant, and cultivated; and many
rivers flow through them to swell the stream of the Tigris. Insulated hill-forts, from 2000 to 5000 feet high, occur in this country,
with flat cultivated tops some miles in extent, accessible only by
ladders, or holes cut in their precipitous sides. These countries are
full of ancient inscriptions and remains of antiquity. The moisture
decreases more and more south from Shiraz, and then the parallel
ridges, repulsive in aspect and difficult to pass, are separated by arid
longitudinal valleys, which ascend like steps from the narrow shores
of the Persian Gulf to the table-land. The coasts of the gulf are
burning hot sandy solitudes, so completely barren, that the country
from Bassora to the Indus, a distance of 1200 miles, is nearly a
sterile waste. In the few favoured spots on the terraces where water
occurs, there is vegetation, and the beauty of these valleys is enhanced by surrounding sterility.'
With the exception of Mazanderan and the other provinces bordering upon the Caspian, and in the Paropamisan range, Persia is
arid, possessing few perennial springs, and not one great river; in
fact, three-tenths of the country is a desert, and the table-land is
nearly a wide scene of desolation. A great salt-desert occupies
27,000 square miles between Irak and Khorasan, of which the soil
is a stiff clay, covered with efflorescence of common salt and nitre,
often an inch thick, varied only by a few saline plants and patches
of verdure in the hollows. This dreary waste joins the large sandy
and equally dreary desert of Kerman. Kelat, the capital of Belochistan, is 7000 feet above the level of the sea: round it there is
cultivation, but the greater part of that country is a lifeless plain,
over which the brick-red sand is drifted by the north wind into
ridges like the waves of the sea, often 12 feet high, without a vestige of vegetation. The blast of the desert, whose hot and pestilential breath is fatal to man and animals, renders these dismal sands
impassible at certain seasons.
Sir John Malcolm on PIer'ia, and Mr. Motric's Travels.