Pigeons may generally be shot for the pot from these kanaats, and afford very good practice; the pigeons are similar to our blue rocks. One simply follows a line of wells, and just before you reach a well, a servant throws a stone into that behind; if there be any pigeons they usually rise and give a fair chance, returning to the kanaat by a neighbouring well. Considerable amusement may be got out of this. Gougas was full of pigeons, and here we first saw the pigeon towers so common in Ispahan. A description of one will serve for all, for they differ merely in size. The towers are constructed simply for the collection of pigeons’ dung, which commands a high price as a manure for the raising of melons, and, in fact, is a kind of guano. The pigeon when living in the kanaats is liable to the depredations of jackals, foxes, etc., so the Ispahanis, the most careful and calculating of the Persian nation, build these towers for the pigeons. They are circular, and vary in height, from twenty to seventy feet, and are sometimes as much as sixty feet in diameter. The door, which is merely an opening in the wall half-way up, is only opened once a year for the collection of the guano, the remainder of the time it is plastered like the rest of the building, which is composed of mud bricks and ornamented with a ring of plaster painted with scrolls or figures in red ochre. These bricks are made on the spot, and cost from one keran to two kerans a thousand. The whole surface of the inside of the circular outer wall is covered with small cells open to one side about twelve inches in size; in these the pigeons build. In the centre of the circle are two walls cutting each other at a right angle, and so forming a cross; the sides and ends of these walls are also covered with cells. I have counted cells for seven thousand one hundred pairs in a large pigeon tower; there were five thousand five hundred in the outer wall, and sixteen hundred in the cruciform wall occupying the centre. Most of those near Ispahan are now in ruins, for as it is no longer the capital, an excessive price cannot be obtained for early melons, and so pigeon-keeping is not so profitable. In no case did the proprietor of the tower feed the birds; they picked up a living from the fields of the neighbours. A ridiculous incident now occurred to us. As we were marching across an immense plain, we noticed men in a crowd on the side of the mountains; they were all armed, and seemed over a hundred in number. We were considerably alarmed to see that they ran in a body towards our caravan, which we had no doubt would now be looted, for what were three revolvers and a cavalry sabre against a hundred armed men? The muleteers ran away, shouting “Doz, doz!” (“Thieves, thieves!”) We could not save ourselves by flight, for two of the party were married—Mr. Hughes and Sergeant Hockey—and their wives were in palikees, or paniers, on the mules.