'Lord Curzon's Notes on Persia' [‎572r] (1145/1386)

TEHRAN.
9
for comfortable occupation. It is commodious and most con
veniently situated on the river bank at the lower landing-place.
It has good rooms, large and small. On the outside faces, front
and rear, are other quarters, one row of which, along with those
in the deep gateway, are occupied by shop-keepers, butcher, baker,
cotfee-house, carpenter, &c., and grocery and general goods stores,
all brought here and established in business by the Muayin. He
is now engaged in constructing a tramway 3 feet wide, of light
steel rails, laid on sleepers cut in the Karun jungles. The line
runs from the river bank at the caravanserai A roadside inn providing accommodation for caravans (groups of travellers). to the landing-place
above the rapids, with a short connection into the serai. The
length is 2,400 yards. A storage-room and shelter-shed are being
built at the lower end, and there will be the same at the farther
end. The track has been laid out, and a portion of the way
made. About 150 yards of rail had been laid when I was there,
and the work is being carried on steadily. A river face wall is
being built behind the serai where native craft lie, and the
intention is to use the tramway at once for removal of material
from its cuttings and vicinity with which to fill in and level up
the hollow ground between the serai and the embankment.
The permanent way of the tram line is simply rammed earth,
the sleepers being laid on this at intervals of 24 feet, the spaces
between to be filled up with broken brick and stone. The
mistake of not ramming the earth over a packing of stone beneath
was pointed out to the Muayin. There is an abundance of stone all
about, much of it in the form of cut and hewn blocks, remains of
ancient Ahwaz. The river face wall is being largely constructed
of these blocks and of great sections of circular pillars. These
pillar pieces have all a hole in the centre, evidently originally
made to allow of a stout pole being passed through, and drag
ropes used in rolling them along. They are now dug out of the
ruins by Arabs and soldiers, who use their donkeys in wheeling
them where required, in probably the same manner as was
practised some 1,500 years ago.
From the numbers of fallen pillars now lying just as they fell Ruins,
on the banks of the old irrigation canal which ran out of the Old canal.
Karun close above the rapids, and the remains of a bridge there,
it would appear as if buildings with colonades had stood on each
side the bridge connecting. I saw no carving on any of the
stones or pillars. The line of the great canal is clearly visible
leading away south, and I was told that it passed to Felahiah,
about 40 miles distant, where it joined a stream flowing to the
sea, or a canal passing into the Karun. Colonel Bell observed
this canal indication, and was led to suppose that it might have
been a navigating one used in the old Ahwaz days to turn
the rapids and the dam. But, as explained in his report,
he was unable to examine the ground as closely as he desired.
I had full opportunity of doing this, and judged from
its appearance that a channel could easily be cut from the old
canal-bed to the river below rapid No. 4, and so make a navi
gating canal, about 1,600 yards in length, with a comparatively