28 JOURNEYS IN PERSIA LETTER xvn

a small quantity of salol, a newish drug, with directions
for its use, and his master Hadji undertook to make
him take it regularly, and hot tea when he fancied it, and
at the end of twenty-two hours he was not only free
from fever hut from pain, and was able to mount a
mule.1

There are two definite objects of interest close to the
plain of Chaman Kushan, the reputed source of the Karun
and the great artificial cleft of Kar Kanun. I visited the
first on a misty day, which exaggerated the height of the
mountains, and by filling their chasms with translucent
blue atmosphere gave a rare loveliness to the whole, for
it must be said that the beauties of Persian scenery are
usually staring, hard, and unveiled. The fords of two or
three rivers, including the Karun, some steep ascents and
descents, a rough ride along a stony slope of the Zard
Kuh, and the crossing of a very solid snow-bridge took us
to the top of a cliff exactly opposite the powerful springs
in which the Karun has its reputed origin.

Over this source towers the mighty range of the Zard
Kuh,—a colossal mountain barrier, a mass of yellow and
gray limestone, with stupendous snow-filled chasms, huge
precipices, and vast snow-fields, treeless and destitute of
herbage except where the tulip-studded grass runs up to
meet the moisture from the snow-fields. It is the birth-
place of innumerable torrents, but one alone finds its way
to the sea.

These springs are in a lateral slit in a lofty lime-
stone precipice below a snow-field, at one end of

1 For the benefit of other travellers I add that the dose of salol was
ten grains every three hours. I found it equally efficacious after-
wards in several cases of acute rheumatism with fever. I hope that the
general reader will excuse the medical and surgical notes given in these
letters. I am anxious to show the great desire for European medical aid,
and the wide sphere that is open to a medical missionary, at least for
physical healing.