them good eating. Here also were rice grounds, embanked from the river by low mud walls. They can be laid under water at the discretion of the cultivator. Whole fields of lucerne waved beautifully along the banks, which sometimes yield eight crops in the year.

A little below this spot, we passed the village and tower of Dair, very prettily situated on the margin of the stream, and embosomed amidst tamarisk trees. The Arabian historian Fath Ullah, in his history of modern Bassorah, entitled Zad ul Moosafir, written upwards of a century and a half ago, speaks of Dair, as a town north-west of Bassorah, remarkable for a tower of such colossal dimensions and beautiful structure as to appear to be the work of genii; and Ibn ul Wardi, in addition to a similar account, says, that strange sounds are occasionally heard to proceed from the interior of this tower. Great antiquity is attributed to this minaret by all the natives of the country.

The hamlet of Maghaul is marked out by a large mud walled house standing on the river's margin, and exhibiting the appearance of a "nunnery." It has been recently erected by the political resident in Turkish Arabia, and is occasionally occupied by him as a country seat. The distance by land from this to Bassorah is about seven miles. The traces of the canal of Obillah, the Apologus of Arrian and Nearchus, may yet be traced from this neighbourhood, almost as far as the vicinity of Zobair, which town stands at the distance of eight miles to the south-west of the present Bassorah, and is the site of the ancient city of Omar, where may still be seen the mosque of Ali (not the Barmecide), the nephew of Mahommed.

Five miles below Maghaul, and on the same side of the stream, a minaret marks the entrance to the Bassorah Khore, or creek. This arabesque minaret rises in the form of a spire, like the tomb of Haroun al Raschid's consort on the western bank of

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ARABESQUE MINARET.

the Tigris, at Baghdad. We anchored near the mutesellem's (governor) guard ship, and found the "Hydery" of Calcutta, and the Sophia" of Bombay, moored in five fathoms at high-water mark.

66

BASSORAH.

119

CHAPTER V.

Bassorah-Its Commerce-My Ascent of the Euphrates-Expensive Interment-Sacred City-Projected Survey of the Euphrates-District of Junub-Canal of Hafar-The KaroonMaritime Arabs-Arrival at Bushire-Trade of Bushire-Trade of the Persian Gulf-Ophthalmia-Abdul Russool-Women of Bushire-Persian Tobacco-The Muezzins-Russian Ambition.

BASSORAH is the principal inlet from the Persian Gulf, through which all eastern productions find their way into the Turkish empire. Although its commerce is at present inconsiderable, it would be immense were only the rich and extensive countries traversed by the Euphrates and Tigris inhabited by a civilised and industrious people. Its imports from Europe are by the way of Beirout, Haleb (Aleppo), and Baghdad-from India, via Muscat and Bushire. From Persia it imports shawls, carpets, and jewels; from Bahrain, pearls; and from Mocha, slaves and coffee. Its exports are bullion, copper (from

Asia Minor), raw-silk, horses, gall-nuts, and a great variety of drugs. The export of dates alone exceeds twelve thousand tons

per annum. The trade with the interior of the country is not conducted by caravans, as formerly, Baghdad now being the emporium whence all the kafilahs start. Commerce might, however, be carried on to immense advantage by means of a few small iron steamers.

I hope I shall not be indicted for "crimen læsæ majestatis," if I state in this place, that when I commanded the escort attached to the political resident in Turkish Arabia, and with views precisely assimilating with those subsequently adopted by Colonel Chesney*, I ascended the Euphrates (May

*In a letter to me on this subject, Colonel Chesney thus expresses himself: "I claim nothing before 1830. Any voyage made by you previously must have been the very first in modern times." The reader will presently see, that even the official reply of the East India Company to my application to survey the Euphrates, was dated as early as 1829.