We reach Sar~i Kasbti
about, and covers the northern side of a round heap of a hill
called Bala Buzurg which fills up the landscape south of the
Kangaveri and which Sir A. T. Wilson saw and mentions
when he travelled from Khurramabad and had it on the west.
It has a very holy imamzadeh on its southern slope, and frequent
bandits on the top near the passes. It forms, as it were, the
boundary between the open downs and the jungle, though
the older Ittivends remember thick trees north of it, in all the
country of the Giza Rud up to Chia Dozdan, as recently as
fifty years ago.
After nearly two hours' riding up the Kangaveri in absolute
solitude, we came to a small mill built of boulders with no
mortar, down by the water's edge: and here we saw the miller,
a ragged Ittivend with four wild children round him, who got
over his astonishment at the sight of us so far as to point out
the way to the tents of Amanulla Khan, whom we were look-
ing for, along a little tributary to the south. All this part of
the valley is full of flint, pinkish and white in colour, cropping
out through what looks like limestone: the presence of so
much raw material for their instruments may have had
something to do with the thick population of the region in
the days before metals.
We climbed up the steep little stream towards the lower
shoulders of Bala Buzurg, and after about twenty minutes
came out into a green corrie full of stunted oak and beech-like
bushes, and with two settlements of Ittivend tents at a small
distance from each other.
Amanulla Khan was away; he had gone for five days to
Alishtar to pay his taxes. It was most unfortunate, for there
appeared to be no one left with any authority, and the tribes-
men received us with far from welcoming looks. They
spread a rug in the open guest room of the tent and sat round
in a gloomy silence. Unlike my other guides, Keram made
[51]