42

TRACK OF A LION.

The square masses of brick (mentioned in the note) must have been washed away, if ever any existed; for no traces of such buildings remain. As it is some years since Keppel visited this spot, and the river is still advancing with great force and rapidity, I have little doubt that a few more yearly freshes will sweep away even the present remains, "and leave not a wreck behind."

The smell of wild animals was extremely offensive at this place; and, as a heavy shower of rain had fallen during the night, rendering the soil moist, we traced the footsteps of a lion to an extensive patch of brushwood, where, very probably, he was concealed. Not one of my guards would approach or attempt to disturb the bushes, pretending not to see the

eye of a traveller, and have, at first sight, the appearance of sandy hillocks. On a nearer inspection they prove to be square masses of brick, facing the cardinal points, and though some. times much worn by the weather, are built with much regularity: the neighbourhood of these large mounds is strewed with fragments of tile, broken pottery, and manufactured vitreous substances."

DEFECTIVE EYESIGHT.

43

thicket which was before them; nevertheless they are very near-sighted. I have seldom met with a man that can distinguish with accuracy an object at the distance of half a mile; and many of them cannot fix their eyes on any given spot without causing much annoyance to their organs of vision.

CHAPTER III.

Water-courses.-Remarkable mounds.-Blocks of black stone. Fruitless excavation.-Earthen vase.-Party of horsemen.-Insulated pile, called Shejur.-Curious column.-Remains of a wall.-Earthen vases. es.--Ruins, called Hoomania.-Discovery of Athenian coins.-Fleet of boats. -Their singular construction.-The Kooffah, a wickerbasket.-Ruins of a Fort.-Armed horseman.-Appearance of the river.-View of Tauk Kesra.--History of the Arabs.

NOVEMBER 1st.-During the course of today I crossed no less than forty water-courses, all running in an easterly direction, dug for the purpose of facilitating the irrigation of the interior part of the country, and carrying off the exuberant waters. * I occasionally saw the ske

* "Towards Babylon and Seleucia, where the rivers Tigris and Euphrates swell over their banks and water the country, the same kind of husbandry is practised as in Egypt, but to

REMARKABLE MOUNDS.

45

letons of cattle, probably destroyed by the wild beasts; on this account, the flocks of every encampment are always driven at sunset into a thorny inclosure within the tents. At three in the afternoon I crossed the stream, and proceeded four miles from the left bank, in a westerly direction, to some mounds, which I reached at four. They stretched for nearly a mile north and south, and were composed of soft clay, externally covered with broken pieces of pottery, fragments of tile, flint glass, and shells. The highest mound, which occupied a central position, I estimated at five and twenty feet, surrounded by minor ridges of hillock; which are invariably the proofs of ruined buildings. On the top of the largest, to my great surprise, I stumbled upon some blocks of black stone, measuring four or five feet square, and completely

honeycombed from exposure.

Hitherto I felt

convinced that no stone was to be found in the

better effect and greater profit. The people here let in the water by sluices and flood-gates as they require it."-Plin. Nat. Hist. book 18, c. 18.

46

FRUITLESS EXCAVATION.

country; and the prevailing opinion of all those who have examined the remains of antiquity in these parts, has been, that burnt and unburnt bricks were the chief, I may add, only materials used for building in past times, as well as at the present day.

Concluding, then, that these stones must have been extracted from beneath the tumulus, I commenced clearing away at the base; and as far as I dug, I found that the mound rested on layers of stone, each measuring about five feet square, so firmly joined together, that my digging implements broke to pieces, and obliged me to discontinue any farther attempt at excavation. There was no appearance of erect building whatever, nor any burnt or unburnt bricks, except on the summit, where I saw some fragments of brickwork perfectly black, petrified, and molten. I found a large portion of an earthen vase, (similar to some I have dug up near a village called Reschire, five miles to the south of Bushire in the Persian Gulph,) and human bones lying by it. This vessel was