Manuscript of Persia and the Persian Question (Continued) [‎44v] (88/690)

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specie? Dl gniTer wmeu ueeupies me cum re 01 me Hireei, una wmcn,
in the absence of any scavengers, would be an impassable slough,
were it not that the town, being situated on an elevation with a
sandy soil, the rains sweep down much of the accumulations, and
that these are found to have a marketable value in autumn as
manure for the opium plantations outside the town.
Another remarkable feature of the place, not, however, visible
from the exterior, is the almost universal construction of ftiWwwWw , 1
underground chambers hewn deep down in the rock upon which
the city stands, ventilated by shafts conducting to the upper air.
Almost every house is so provided ; and one of these cellars that was
shown to me, newly hollowed out beneath the Governor’s palace, had
been excavated to a depth of at least sixty feet below the surface,
access to it being gained by a steep flight of steps, and light as well
as air being admitted by a circular orifice in the vaulted rock-roof.
In the months of July and August, when the heat is appalling, the
itihabitants live almost entirely in their subterranean chambers,
seldom stirring between 9 a.m. an<][ sunset, and at such times the
town becomes even more than ordinarily a necropolis in brick and
stone. k
The trade of Shuster is equally inconsiderable with the agricul
tural development of its surrounding lands. Though possessed of
’ a soil admirably adapted to the growth of opium, but little enterprise
is shown in its cultivation, and only twenty or thirty cases are said to
be exported annually to the Arabian coast and Muscat. Indigo is
grown in some quantity outside the town, and is responsible for a
predominant tone of blue in the costumes of both sexes. -Lieutenant
Selby, in 1842, though reporting the local trade as small, lamented
that nearly all the cottons, woollens, chintzes, cutlery, hardware, and
sugar were supplied by Hussia, notwithstanding a long and tedious
land-carriage from Isfahan . 2 Whatever may have been the case
fifty years ago, I found that Russian ascendancy had now completely
ceased, there being few, if any, Russian articles in the town, and the
European import trade consisting almost entirely of English or
Indian goods, brought from Busrah either via Amarah on the Tigris
and Dizful, or by Mohammerah and the Karun River. The sole
local manufactures appear to be a species of bright-coloured carpet
or matting, made of cotton and wool, and a felt of coarse pattern.
The bazaar, which was once the largest in Khuzistan, consists only
of two diminutive alleys crossing each other under a dome, of the
stalls before alluded to, and of one or two open booths, with a roof
-.resting on stone supports, that still survive in the centre of the
(1) Elsewhere in Persia they are called serdabs, literally “cold water.” Layajrd says
they are known in Shuster as shadrewan [Early Adventures, vol. ii.
■al.nirr. wae rinmo f tflW"
(2) Journal of the ('>aoyeti,nhiraI Sae'ety, vol. xiv., p. 234, 242.
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