about three
farsakhs. It may be a trifle more, but any native tells you at once that
it is three farsakhs from Hormuz Island to the creek where you land to go
up to Minao. _Hormuzdia_ was the name of the region in the days of its
prosperity. Some people say that Hormuzdia was known as _Jerunia_, and Old
Hormuz town as _Jerun_." (In this I suspect tradition has gone astray.)
"The town and fort of Minao lie to the N.E. of the ancient city, and are
built upon the lowest spur of the Bashkurd mountains, commanding a gorge
through which the Rudbar river debouches on the plain of Hormuzdia." In
these new and interesting particulars it is pleasing to find such precise
corroboration both of Edrisi and of Ibn Batuta. The former, writing in the
12th century, says that Hormuz stood on the banks of a canal or creek from
the Gulf, by which vessels came up to the city. The latter specifies the
breadth of sea between Old and New Hormuz as _three farsakhs_. (_Edrisi_,
I. 424; _I. B._ II. 230.)

I now proceed to recapitulate the main features of Polo's Itinerary from
Kerman to Hormuz. We have:--

Marches
1. From Kerman across a plain to the top of a
mountain-pass, where _extreme cold was
experienced_ . . . . . . . . 7
2. A descent, occupying . . . . . . . 2
3. A great plain, called _Reobarles_, in a much warmer
climate, abounding in francolin partridge, and in
dates and tropical fruit, with a ruined city of former
note, called _Camadi_, near the head of the plain,
which extends for . . . . . . . . 5
4. A second very bad pass, descending for 20 miles, say 1
5. A well-watered fruitful plain, which is crossed to
_Hormuz_, on the shores of the Gulf . . . . 2
--
Total 17

No European traveller, so far as I know, has described the most direct
road from Kerman to Hormuz, or rather to its nearest modern representative
Bander Abbasi,--I mean the road by Baft. But a line to the eastward of
this, and leading through the plain of Jiruft, was followed partially by
Mr. Abbott in 1850, and completely by Major R. M. Smith, R.E., in 1866.
The details of this route, except in one particular, correspond closely in
essentials with those give