BOKHA'RA, a country situated in Central Asia, exhibits the industry of its inhabitants in the cultivation of their lands. The larger and the smaller canals, both of which are nu merous, must have required a good deal of labour when they were first made ; and they are still kept up at a considerable expense. Cotton, hemp, sesamum, tobacco, and a few dyestuffs are cultivated.
Gold is found among the sands of the Amoo, and collected from it in many places along its banks. All other metals are imported from Russia. Salt is dug out in masses in some parts of the desert, and on the banks of the Amoo, below Chard jooee. Alum and brim stone are got in the neighbourhood of Samar cand, and sal-ammoniac in its native state occurs in the mountainous district.
The mechanical arts are not neglected, and some commodities are even made for exporta tion. The most extensive manufactures are those of cotton and silk; and some kinds of cloth, in which both materials era combined, are in great demand in Russia for dresses of the rich nobility. The dye of all
their manufactured goods is excellent. The Bokharians do not understand the art of tan ning so well as the Russians, but they make excellent Mance° leather. Their swords are good, but much inferior to those of Persia.
The chief city, also called Bokhara, is a place of much commercial importance. There are six commercial routes radiating from it. One of these leads to Samarcand, Khokand, and Kash gar ; another to Khiva and Astrakhan ; a third through the Kirghis region between the Sea of Aral and the Caspian; a fourth to Merve and Meshed; a fifth to the Oxus and Herat; and a sixth to Balkh, Khooloom, Bameean, and Cabul. Most of the commodities of Asia and Europe find their way along one or other of these six routes.