‘Gazetteer of Persia, Part III, including Fārs, Lūristān, Arabistān, Khūzistān, Yazd, Karmānshāh, Ardalān, Kurdistān’ [‎95v] (195/686)

CHA-CHA
The most fertile spots in the territory of the Chab Shaikh are those
in the environs of D5rak, and on the banks of the Hafar and Shatt-ul-
Arab. H ere alone dates and rice are produced, and from these districts
the Shaikh derives the principal part of his revenues. TV heat and barley
are only grown in scanty portions, scarcely sufficient for the supply of
the inhabitants in the immediate vicinity of the towns and villages.
The rice harvest is in August and September, and that of other grain
in April and May. The first is cultivated in those parts which are
well watered by artificial canals drawn from the different rivers ; but
the latter is chiefly dependent on the periodical tains for its nourish
ment. The north and west parts of the country afford tolerable pastu
rage ; and here the wandering tribes, which compose no small portion
of the population, pitch their tents. Both banks of the Karun, from
its junction with the Ab-i-tal below Shustar, are uninhabited, and con
sequently uncultivated and covered with brushwood, the resort of lions,
wild boars, and other animals. Morasses are also common in this
country towards Goban and the sea, and between Dorak and the
Karun. The Chab country is watered by three rivers, the Karun, Tab,
and Jarahi. The Chabs possess large flocks of camels.
The commerce of the Chabs is limited, and flows in different
channels, according to the season of the year. Some of it reaches
Muhammarah, and is mixed up with the trade of that port. The principal
seaports of the Chabs are Bandar Mashhur and Hindiyan. The trade
of Chab, says Belly, will always be confined to Chab itself and to the
provinces of Shustar and Bihbahan. The passes leading into the
plateau of Persia from these points may possess strategic advantages,
but they are not lines that trade could work to a profit in competition
with Bushahr, Abbass, or Baghdad; rice, corn, ghee, and the products
generally of semi-pastoral and semi-agricultural tribes enjoying a rich
soil and fine water command might be expected from the territory
contained between the Karun river, the Bakhtiari, and Kuhgehlu moun
tains, the Hindiyan, and Bahr-el-mashir. Dates, of course, may form
an item and be grown, as also might cotton, over a large area. The
Chab territory is by no means an easy one to traverse. In the rainy
season the direct road from the Hafar to Dorak is quite impassable,
and even the circuitous road by the Karun is almost equally so. And,
after the subsidence of the rains, this tract would be fatal to horses and
men from the marsh insects and miasma. Grass is plentiful in the
spring of favourable years, but in dry seasons nothing is to be got, for
the chopped straw of the last year is exhausted, and the grass is too
short, while corn is only found round the villages. The water, too, is
brackish along the whole line, unless when drawn from the river; that
from the Hafar and Hindiyan is delicious, but the water from the
Dorak canal is rough, distasteful, and unwholesomq, especially in the
summer months.
The Chab territory is really tributary to Persia, and pays a con
siderable sum into the Shustar provincial treasury. Its element of
greatest commercial strength and military weakness lies in the bounti
ful supply of water. It would be difficult to find a country of equal
extent, where fresh water containing sufficient silt is poured along the
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