Hot Springs, 'curing Itch,' I Noticed At Two Places On The
Urzu-Baft Road.
There were some near Qal'ah Asgber and others near Dashtab;
they were frequented by people suffering from skin-diseases, and were
highly sulphureous; the water of those near Dashtab turned a silver ring
black after two hours' immersion.
Another reason of my advocating the Urzu
road is that the bitter bread spoken of by Marco Polo is only found on it,
viz. at Baft and in Bardshir. In Sirjan, to the west, and on the roads to
the east, the bread is sweet. The bitter taste is from the Khur, a bitter
leguminous plant, which grows among the wheat, and whose grains the people
are too lazy to pick out. There is not a single oak between Bender 'Abbas
and Kerman; none of the inhabitants seemed to know what an acorn was. A
person at Baft, who had once gone to Kerbela via Kermanshah and Baghdad,
recognised my sketch of tree and fruit immediately, having seen oak and
acorn between Kermanshah and Qasr-i-Shirin on the Baghdad road." Major
Sykes writes (ch. xxiii.): "The above description undoubtedly refers to the
main winter route, which runs via Sirjan. This is demonstrated by the fact
that under the Kuh-i-Ginao, the summer station of Bandar Abbas, there is a
magnificent sulphur spring, which, welling from an orifice 4 feet in
diameter, forms a stream some 30 yards wide. Its temperature at the source
is 113 degrees, and its therapeutic properties are highly appreciated. As
to the bitterness of the bread, it is suggested in the notes that it was
caused by being mixed with acorns, but, to-day at any rate, there are no
oak forests in this part of Persia, and I would urge that it is better to
accept our traveller's statement, that it was due to the bitterness of the
water." - However, I prefer Gen. Houtum-Schindler's theory. - H. C.]
[1] It is but fair to say that scholars so eminent as Professors Sprenger
and Blochmann have considered the original suggestion lawful and
probable. Indeed, Mr. Blochmann says in a letter: "After studying a
language for years, one acquires a natural feeling for anything
un-idiomatic; but I must confess I see nothing un-Persian in
rudbar-i-duzd, nor in rudbar-i-lass.... How common lass is, you
may see from one fact, that it occurs in children's reading-books." We
must not take Reobarles in Marco's French as rhyming to (French)
Charles; every syllable sounds. It is remarkable that Las, as the
name of a small State near our Sind frontier, is said to mean, "in the
language of the country," a level plain. (J. A. S. B. VIII. 195.)
It is not clear what is meant by the language of the country. The
chief is a Brahui, the people are Lumri or Numri Biluchis, who are,
according to Tod, of Jat descent.
[2] Sir Henry Rawlinson objects to this identification (which is the same
that Dr. Karl Mueller adopts), saying that Organa is more probably
"Angan, formerly Argan." To this I cannot assent.
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