The old man is then to be seen going leisurely along the water-courses which issue from the underground channels, accompanied by his young deputy carrying the long-handled Persian spade, ready to run and execute his orders.

Disputes between village and village over _kanat_ water-cuts form the subject of severe fights occasionally, and the saying is that water and women are the main causes of village quarrels in Persia.
It was a hot day in June, and having been up before daylight so as to start at earliest dawn and avoid the mid-day heat for my whole party, we were all in the enjoyment of afternoon sleep, when the courtyard was invaded by a shouting mob of excited villagers, calling on me to hear their story and bear witness to their wounds.

They said they were the tenants of the landlord whose house I was occupying, and they begged me as his guest to make a statement of their case, so that justice might be done.

There had been a dispute over an irrigation channel, and the opposing side having mustered strong, they were overpowered by numbers and badly beaten.

Some of the hurts they had received were ugly to look at, having been inflicted with the long-handled Persian spade, the foot-flanges of which make it a dangerous weapon.