above the sea, and four hundred feet below the city of Oroomiah. No
living thing exists in its waters, which are both salt and
bituminous.

The plain is more crowded with villages than here represented, and
each one is made conspicuous by its grove of trees, as well as its
houses. The city appears prominent at the foot of the hill, though
six miles distant from the spectator. It is in the same latitude
with Richmond, Virginia, and contains about thirty-five thousand
souls. The plain slopes up very gradually from the lake, and Mount
Seir rises, behind our point of view, two thousand eight hundred and
thirty-four feet above the city. Farther west, the summits of
Central Koordistan rise, range above range, to the height of
seventeen thousand feet.

We pass down from Seir to the city by a carriage road, now by the
side of vineyards, and now near fields of wheat and clover,
diversified by orchards and gardens of cucumbers. All of these, and
indeed the whole plain, owes its fertility to canals, led out from
the rivers which descend from the mountains. Willow, poplar, and
sycamore trees line these watercourses. All kinds of fruit trees
abound, while the rich verdure of the plain contrasts strikingly
with the bare declivities that overlook it from every side. The
villages on either hand are clusters of mud houses crowded together
for greater security, and every tree in their groves has to be
watered as regularly as the fields and gardens.

Before reaching the city we must ford the Shaher, a river that,
though frequently all drained off into the fields in summer, is very
deep in early spring, when fatal accidents sometimes occur. It was