Sykes' History of Persia - Heritage Institute

„ DESERTS, RIVERS, ETC. 21
off moisture from it. I have mentioned above how the
inadequate water supply dries up and disappears, being
unable to form trunk river systems powerful enough to
force their way to the sea. Failing signally to do this,
the scanty streams which, as a rule, are utterly undrinkable,
owing to their saltness, are lost in basins. Within these
are immense gravel slopes, occasional salt lakes, and square
miles of sandhills backed by naked, jagged ranges or
Persian Sierras, which complete a melancholy and de-
pressing picture.
Pierre Loti's description in Le Desert
is so true and so beautifully expressed that I cannot
refrain from quoting it :
C'est la desolation absolue, le grand triomphe incontest^ de la
mort ... on est la comme dans les mondes finis, d^peupl^s par
le feu, qu'aucune rosee ne fdcondera plus.
To cross the Lut means at the best bad water and the
carnage of all supplies, including forage. At its worst it
means being caught in a storm which is equally to be
dreaded for its cold in winter or for its parching effect in
summer ; and the toll of the desert, levied on man and
beast alike, is indeed a heavy one, whether the caravan
sinks into the ochrous slime of the Kavir or is lost amid
the terrible moving sandhills. In either case there are
few survivors.
Among the agencies which produce such dire results
are wind and the process of disintegration.
In a humid
country vegetation and moisture alike protect
the surface
of the soil ; but in a land where nothing more than a few
stunted bushes can grow the force of moving air is
powerful to a degree that is only beginning
Disintegration, too, is rapid. The extremes of temperature
co-operate powerfully with wind and rain in breaking
up the misnamed ** eternal " hills.-^
•
to be realized.
This huge desert has left a deep mark on its inhabitants.
Separating north from south and east from
west more effectively than high ranges of snow -clad
mountains or a gulf of equal size, it has necessarily made
government very difficult ; for a distant chief could
^ There are some remarkable illustrations of wind erosion in Ruins of Desert Cathay,