"بلاد فارس والشأن الفارسي من إعداد السيد المحترم جورج ناثانييل كورزون، عضو البرلمان." [‎٧‎٣] (٧١٤/١٠٤)

THAN SCASPIA
by the electric light, which was also to be found at Amu Daria,
and with which it was proposed before long, by means of accumu
lators, to light the passenger waggons. A railway train lit by the
electric light and speeding through the sand-deserts of Central
Asia, would add one more to the many startling contrasts in which
this extraordinary region abounds. On the further parts of the
line the stations were now completed, and the temporary structures
which I had noticed in 1888 had been replaced by neat buildings
in brick or stone. A good deal of money had been spent during
the past year in constructing new bridges and culverts to carry off
the unpremeditated but disastrous torrents that sweep down after
sudden rains from the Persian mountains. But, nevertheless,
thirty miles of rail near Kizil Arvat, the ever vulnerable spot, had
again been destroyed during a storm in July; and the danger is
one against which, as in the far more serious case of the Bolan
Railway in Beluchistan, it will always be difficult to guard alto
gether. M. Bielinski, the Polish contractor, who built the big
wooden bridge over the Oxus and the smaller bridges over the
Tejend and Murghab, was a traveller by the same boat as myself,
having received a contract to replace the wooden bridge over the
Tejend by an iron fabric at a cost of 80,000^ A similar change
was next contemplated at the same cost over the Murghab at
Merv. It does not appear, however, that either of these changes
has been carried into effect, though a new girder bridge has been
erected across the Zerafshan at Kara Kul. The great wooden
bridge over the Oxus at Charjui (which, it will be remembered,
was a marvel of cheapness, having been constructed in the space of
100 days for 30,000/.) had again broken down a few months before,
as it must continue to do when any great strain of uncommon
flood or shifting channel is directed against it. But it appears, on
the whole, to be better adapted to the situation than would any
more costly substitute ; whilst, by frequent repairs and, if neces
sary, extensions in order to accommodate the vagabond humours of
the river, it may continue to serve all essential purposes. The
channel, I have since heard, has shifted more than half a mile to the
eastwards, and the bridge has had to be extended to keep it com-
any.
Not much advance had been made in the interim with the
problem of the navigation of the Oxus above Charjui. Ihe two
barges which were built for the carriage either of cargo or of