Introduction
the greater part of Persia, while, owing to the more southerly latitudes, tremendous dry heat is experienced in the summer months. The little rivers flowing from the low mountain ranges of the plateau trickle down on to the plain, and would dry up in the parching desert, were they not instantly caught up by the thousand irrigation canals built by the natives to water their vineyards, melon-gardens and rice-fields. Conditions exist for intensive cultivation unknown in Anatolia and Armenia, and thus the cultivation of fruit and rice has become the great industry of the Persian oases. The unsurpassed excellence of Persia's sub-tropical produce has given rise to a great trade with the inhabitants of the Russian plain to the north. This has materially enriched its people and has enabled them, in spite of invasions and disturbances, to develop a high culture. Throughout all the ages, in spite of Mongol, Tartar and Arab invasions and devastations, Nature through the agency of the fertile oases has restored to Iran the damage inflicted on her by man, and has given the Persian that material wealth which has enabled him to build up a culture of undying fame. Every foreign race that has subdued Persia politically, has within a short period become culturally assimilated to her. The barbarian Hulagu Khan who overran her in the 13th century was the founder of the Ilkhan dynasty, which within a generation had accepted Islam and acquired Persian names. Iran has always been the creator of abstract ideas, philosophies, mysteries, and schools of thought, which she has sent forth to the East and to the West.
But the oasis-dwellers do not form the only element in the population. Like Armenia, Persia has been afflicted
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