“Once past Thal,” says Oliver, “and the banks of the Kurram River reached—more or less all along are cornfields and fruit gardens, mulberry groves and fertile glades, passing up to ridges crested by oak and olive, yew trees and pines; the range behind again culminating in the snow-capped peak of Sika Ram, which rises over 15,000 feet high. Some parts of the valley have the reputation of being unhealthy, for the same reason as Bannu, but there are few more fertile spots along the Afghan Border than the Kurram.” The valley is about sixty miles long and in some parts not more than ten miles broad; it is bounded on the west by Afghanistan, on the east by the country of the Chamkannis, Zaimukhts and Orakzais, on the south by Waziristan, while on the north Kurram is separated from the country of the Shinwaris by the Safed Koh Range. “Dark pine forests cover the lower ranges, and naked cliffs and snowy peaks rise high above them. The chain is so situated that the rays of the setting sun fall full upon it, and the effect on a chill winter evening, when the pale snows flush scarlet and crimson, while darkness is already gathering in the valley below, is very fine.” Enriquez, from whose work, _The Pathan Borderland_, quotation has already been made, tells us that “Lower Kurram,[133] that is as far as Alizai, differs very essentially from the Upper Kurram and in appearance resembles the Miranzai. The villages are built of rough and irregular blocks of stone interspersed with layers of brushwood. Towers and defensive walls are the exception, and the inhabitants are but poorly armed. The fodder is collected in ricks inside the hamlets, and great stacks of hay and ‘johwar’ are also grouped together in large numbers on rising ground near by. The valley is narrow, and there is little room for cultivation. The trees are few and stunted, and the general appearance of the country is of low hills and broken nullahs, where the usual ‘palosa,’ bera, seneta and mazarai form a thin scrub jungle. Upper Kurram, on the other hand, is wider, and the mountains containing it are more imposing. There is a good deal of cultivation; the villages are larger and far more prosperous looking, and are built chiefly of mud. The more important ones have from eight to ten fortified towers, and are besides protected by high loop-holed walls. A very successful attempt is made to decorate these forts by means of patterns in the brickwork and of crenelations along the upper parapets. They are, moreover, neatly built and kept in good repair. Chenar trees abound and grow to as fine a size as they do in Kashmir. To judge by their girth, many of them must be very old. There are willows, mulberries and ‘palosa’ in the valley and the walnuts of Kurram rival those of Tirah.” The valley is said, with pride, to produce four remarkable and marketable commodities—the stone of Malana, the rice of Karman, the wood of Peiwar, and the women