Where Rain is Dreaded.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 7935, 26 September 1905, Page 3

Where Rain is Dreaded.

'tiic of the mosl extraordinary cities in the world is Yczd, in Central Persia. .Situated in the midst of a vast salt desert, which stretches for hundreds of miles in all dircciions, it is insular (says a writer to the T.A.L.) beyond even tlie insularity of islands. The nearest inhabited place of any size is Isfahan, and that is 2no miles away. When you send a letter to Isfahan from Yczd, if your friend writes by return of post, you may pet your answer back in a month. The irHra bit ants or Yezd who have been away from Yezd during their lives number, perhaps, (wo or three score, and ihe bulk of these have not extended their travels further than to Shiraz or Kiriuan in the one direction, or to Isfahan in the other. Yet between fifty and sixty thousand people make the place their home. For ninety-nine,out of every hundred of these the great outside world has not merely no interest—it has absolutely no existence. To this strangely isolated community*! one day in the spring of 189'J, there came a young Englishman, Mr Napier Malcolm. He remained there, without a break, until 1901. Yczd, says Mr Malcolm, is a city made almost entirely of mud. Not only arc the houses built of this material, hut) the very furniture, the fire pans, the grain, the children's toys the bread receptacles, even the beds," are simply mud, moulded into rough form and dried in the sun. In the Yeid shops, the goods mostly mud, are displayed on tiers of mud ledges and there is a mud room behind, pie bakers' ovens are of .mud, down to the very doors. Many of the Yezdis even eat mud, and dcvelope an unwholesome muddy complexion in consequence. Rain is one thing dreaded in Yezd. Once during Mr Malcolms stay it rairnd for an entire day-an almost unheard of thing-. of I!™* le>iU , l L! hat st ' u ' ral I'umlmlsof houses melted away over the heads of their occupants, This, however, is nothing like such wo^i al h" y aS 1 Similal hi W"<"K Y».i i accounted elsewhere. A : for a t " n , ot built 10 stand i.or j 1 'wig term of years. In facl H is " s,Jal, y lieteriuinen ny the sue of u s cessnoul wi.u-h OCcapiK the same relative place, an d '\." f thc same relative size as the !?.!?* J •!!; the ezdl moves In anv area' i ! bout ..'thirds"of the city's sene,n,™, ' ua,ly covircd * ilf ' 'lt' ruiMtiw? Vari ° US sUtw of