"تقرير عسكري عن بلاد فارس - المجلد I ١٩٣٠" [ظ‎‎٢‎٢] (١٥٤/٤٩)

32
Nishqpur .—Elevation 4,000 feet, Post and Telegraph
office, population about 15,000, is situated in the fertile
district of the same name which has an area of some 2,000
square miles. The town is surrounded by a mud wall in
which there are four gates. The surrounding country is
very fertile, cotton being the chief product. Two cotton
mills are working in the town, and most of the cotton is
exported to Russia by the Soviet trading agencies.
Bui Khnf .—Elevation 2,800 feet, Post and Telegraph
office, headquarters of the Khaf district, with a population
of about 13,000. Water plentiful from three qanuts (under
ground water channels) and an annual grain produce of
about 20,000 Indian maunds.
Sal'zaimr .—Elevation 3,151 feet, Post and Telegraph
office, population about 30,000. The town is surrounded by
a wall with gates, and has a citadel all of which are in a
broken down and delapidated condition. The trade is in
wool, cottton, silk, dried fruits, and carpets. The latter
is a new industry in this town and dates back only to
1926.
Saralchs .—Post and Telegraph office, population 4,000
(1929) composed of Turks, Baluchis, Kurds, Persians, and
a few Turkoman refugees from Russia.
A squalid and unhealthy town encircled by an old wall
(circumference about two miles) which is penetrated by only
one gate which faces practically south.
The town is situated in barren and low-lying country.
The area is watered by the Tejend river. A great number
of the houses have wells, but the water is very brackish,
and acts as a mild aperient on new comers.
This is characteristic of almost the whole district, and is
popularly supposed to be the cause of an unsightly sore,
like the Baghdad boil, which is called the Zakhum-i-Sarakhs.
Opposite the town gate there is a mill which is worked by
an oil engine, and is capable, when good kerosine is obtain
able, of crushing 150 Meshedi maunds of flour an hour.
What trade there is, is chiefly carried on by smuggling
goods across the border. The majority of these smugglers
are Turkomans who have escaped from the Merv district
since the advent of the Soviet regime and settled in
Persian Sarakhs,