er and richer in tone towards the base. Here at the
bottom, all round the mountain, and in appearance not unlike the waves of
a choppy sea in shallow water, rose hundreds of broken-up, pointed
hillocks, the point of each hillock being invariably turned in a
direction away from the mountain, and these were formed not of sand, but
by a much broken-up stratum of black, burnt slate, at an angle of 20 deg. in
relation to an imaginary horizontal plane.

[Illustration: Author's Caravan and Others Halting in the Desert.]

It was most curious to find these enormous layers of black slate here,
for they were quite different in character from the whole country around.
About two miles further off, north-east, we had, for instance, a range of
mountains of quite a different type, not at all broken up nor with sharp
cutting edges, but quite nicely rounded off. Between this range and the
high peculiar mountain which I have just described--in the flat
stretch--were to be seen some curious hillocks, apparently formed by
water.

N.N.E. was the way towards Birjand, first across a long flat plain
bounded before us by low greyish hills, beyond which a high
mountain-range--the Leker Kuh--towered sublime. Two mountain masses of
fair height stood in front of this range, one N.N.E. on the left of the
track, the other N.N.W., with a white sediment of salt at its base; while
beyond could be distinguished a long flat-topped mountain with a peculiar
white horizontal band half way up it, like a huge chalk mark, all along
its entire length of several miles. This mountain appeared to be some
thirty miles off. The mountain mass to the N.W. showed no picturesque
characteristics, but a more broken-up mountain, somewhat similar to the
one to our N.E., stood between my camp and the range beyond.

As I have already stated, we had come along a dry river bed, and from my
high point of vantage I could see its entire course to the north-west. It
ran in a tortuous manner until it absolutely lost itself in the flat
desert. The long snake-like hill-range separating the parallel valleys
from south-east to north-west appeared to owe its formation to the action
of water, the surface pebbles, even at the summit of it, being well
rounded and worn quite smooth, many with grooves in them.

Near my camp I came across some very curious imprints in the hard rock,
like lava. There were some rocks hollowed out, in a fantastic way, as if
the hollows had been formed by some s