Page 176 - Travels in Arabis (Vol I)

IX.] TRAVELS IN OMAN. 137

conducted, and they then supplied us with a
hearty meal of dates, milk, and dried fruits.
Shirazi contains about two hundred small

houses, built around the commencement or

head of a valley, which extends thence in a
south south-east direction to the plains below.
They are small, square, solid-looking edifices,

and built expressly to withstand the showers
and tempests which in those regions occa­

sionally sweep over them. Narrow loopholes
in the walls serve as windows, and the door

also is very diminutive. None of these edi­
fices have more than one story; and although

for warmth and culinary purposes they are
compelled constantly to have a fire within

them, there is no chimney, nor any outlet for
the smoke except by the door or window.

The inconvenience is not however so great as
might be imagined, since they manufacture

large quantities of charcoal, which is most
commonly used, together with a kind of peat,

procured from some morasses in the lower
part of the valleys. Whether it is owing to

any peculiarity in their mode of preparing
the former, I know not, but I could never

learn that any accidents arise from its use.