d and
round into strips, and drying them in the sun. When dry they are sweeter
than honey, and are carried off for sale all over the country. There is
also abundance of game here, both of birds and beasts.[NOTE 1]

NOTE 1.--SAPURGAN may closely express the pronunciation of the name of the
city which the old Arabic writers call _Saburkan_ and _Shaburkan_, now
called _Shibrgan_, lying some 90 miles west of Balkh; containing now some
12,000 inhabitants, and situated in a plain still richly cultivated,
though on the verge of the desert.[1] But I have seen no satisfactory
solution of the difficulties as to the time assigned. This in the G. T.
and in Ramusio is clearly six days. The point of departure is indeed
uncertain, but even if we were to place that at Sharakhs on the extreme
verge of cultivated Khorasan, which would be quite inconsistent with other
data, it would have taken the travellers something like double the time to
reach Shibrgan. Where I have followed the G. T. in its reading "_quant
l'en a chevauches six jornee tel che je vos ai contes, adunc treuve l'en
une cite_," etc., Pauthier's text has "_Et quant l'en a chevauchie_ les vi
cites, _si treuve l'en une cite qui a nom Sapurgan_," and to this that
editor adheres. But I suspect that _cites_ is a mere lapsus for _journees_
as in the reading in one of his three MSS. What could be meant by
"_chevauchier les_ vi _cites_"?

Whether the true route be, as I suppose, by Nishapur and Meshid, or, as
Khanikoff supposes, by Herat and Badghis, it is strange that no one of
those famous cities is mentioned. And we feel constrained to assume that
something has been misunderstood in the dictation, or has dropt out of it.
As a _probable_ conjecture I should apply the six days to the extent of
pleasing country described in the first lines of the chapter, and identify
it with the tract between Sabzawur and the cessation of fertile country
beyond Meshid. The distance would agree well, and a comparison with Fraser
or Ferrier will show that even now the description, allowing for the
compression of an old recollection, would be well founded; e.g. on the
first march beyond Nishapur: "Fine villages, with plentiful gardens full
of trees, that bear fruit of the highest flavour, may be seen all along
the foot of the hills, and in the little recesses formed by the ravines
whence issues the water that irrigates them. It was a rich and pleasing
scene, and out of question by far the most pop