144 CASUALS IN THE CAUCASUS 



hit, great was the fall thereof. We never secured an 

 undamaged specimen ; the nature of the ground was 

 all against it. 



By late afternoon we were very worn out with the 

 hard going and so much riding, and Kenneth com- 

 plained bitterly of the tortures of his saddle. When 

 we begged him, snappily, for we were all rapidly losing 

 our tempers, not to make so much fuss, he asked if 

 one of us would like to try it for herself. I sampled the 

 rack for half an hour and had more than sufficient. 

 The principal discomfort was the short stirrup, which 

 we ought to have had altered before we left Tiflis. 

 The shortness of it prevented the foot taking any of 

 the weight off the saddle. 



Natives always ride with the shortest of short 

 stirrups, and as this is the saddle, with very slight 

 modifications, of the finest horsemen in the world, 

 Arabs, Persians, Tatars, Kirghis, Caucasians, we came 

 to the conclusion, as do all suffering travellers, that our 

 bad equestrianism was the fault. 



With the shades of night closing in on us, creeping 

 up the slopes like grey ghosts, we found ourselves in a 

 most exposed region. A village Ali remembered, 

 which had lured us on to think of fodder for the ponies 

 and mules, had, by some curious piece of legerdemain, 

 been removed bodily since his time or existed but in 

 his dimming fancy. Even the ubiquitous shepherds 

 were not — we were getting above the lands whereon 

 the cattle pasture. Nothing hving was to be seen now, 

 the defiles and hill-sides were silent as the grave. 



We seemed in for an exposed bivouac, and were 



