'Collection of journals and reports received from Captain the Hon G C Napier, Bengal Staff Corps, on special duty in Persia, 1874. Includes revised index. London: HMSO, 1876' [‎23v] (50/409)

34
i-m
Kelat chain.
Juniper.
Rock inscrip
tion.
Vardeh.
metamorphic rock of a compact crystalline texture of dark grey
colour with many veins of quartz. On entering the hills the
outer slopes are seen to be formed of conglomerate, weathered down
to easy slopes. Under this is a stratum of slate; further on, the
spurs are crowned with regular layers of stratified rock, detached
masses of which cover the slopes and are piled up at their foot.
These were for the most part a hard limestone formed of a mass
of shells, and a fossil substance apparently black coral. The shells
were of various forms, bnt I observe no nummulites. The meta
morphic rocks would appear to have been forced by some con
vulsion of nature through these overlying strata, and form a high
outer barrier of inaccessible crags, rising to a height of 1,000 to
1,500 feet above the hill skirts. After clearing the gorges the
track enters an open valley at the head of which lies the small
village of Kardeh. I was received and hospitably entertained by
Rahim Khan of Choolai, the owner of 12 villages in this and ad
joining valleys. The villages are inhabited by Koords and Turks,
formerly a wild lawless set, but now in better order. They
furnish 40 horsemen for the protection of the border.
28^/a September. Kardeh, 28 miles .—Left Kardeh following
the Kardeh stream through rugged tortuous defiles to a glen in
which it rises among the spurs of a high rocky range, the main
chain of this branch of Elburz. The peaks of this chain present
a most picturesque appearance, the strata of a hard grey limestone
are for the most part on edge, and rise in sharp jagged teeth to a
height of 6,000 or 7,000 feet, or 1,000 to 500 feet above the
general level of the mountain. Vegetation is very scant, the only
tree growing wild is a cypress or juniper {Juniperus excelsa),
common to all parts of the Alburz that are beyond the reach of
the moist breezes of the Caspian. With a stunted scanty growth
this tree has a form and colour exactly suited to the barren rocks on
which it grows. The gnarled and twisted trunk and grey spread
ing branches clinging to the face of a shear cliff or crowning a
rocky pinnacle give a finishing touch to the wild and desolate
picture presented by the higher glens of Elburz, the bare dry
skeleton of a mountain range. Beyond the small hamlet of Aoul,
seven or eight miles from Kardeh, on a chance block of crystalline
limestone, fallen from an over-hanging cliff, is an inscription in
Arabic and Persian, dating from the year 916 of the Hijra, and
recording a victory of Mohamad Shaibani, the Usbeg conqueror
of Bokhara, over the unbelievers whom we may presume to be the
Persian Shiahs.
On a scarped rock closing in the valley in front are the ruins of
an old fort. Following an eastern branch of the valley, in which
the Kardeh stream rises, the route crosses the central ridge by an
exceedingly steep and bad path, and drops at once into the glen of
Vardeh which drains to the Turkoman plain. In the centre of
the glen surrounded by a few poor-looking wheat fields is the
hamlet of 20 houses. The people are Turks and live by grazing
large flocks of sheep and goats; for their fields produce at all
times light crops and often nothing. Shut in by high mountains