196 SAMARKAND. 



respectively. Their massive proportions and grandeur 

 of design compel the gaze and burn a picture upon the 

 tablets of the brain which can never be effaced. Grand, 

 solemn, impressive, are the epithets they conjure up, 

 and all round, in the space which they enclose, the 

 thronging multitudes and noisy booths seem small, 

 puny, inconsequent in comparison. 



Yet there is much that attracts here also, when the 

 mind has had its fill of these enduring monuments, and 

 can focus itself upon the trivialities of the present. 

 Seated upon the ground in a corner of this colossal 

 square was a specimen of that strange genus the story- 

 teller of the East. As his voice rose on the still morn- 

 ing air, a little crowd of long-robed gaudy-coloured 

 humanity thronged round him, jostling one another, 

 chattering trivialities, or listening wide-eyed to the 

 speaker's tale. I listened, and, understanding not, 

 took a surreptitious photograph (see illustration), and 

 passed on. A cook-shop suggested food and refresh- 

 ment. Was there any place where I could lunch ? 

 Certainly not. I was pressed for time, and had not 

 delivered my letters of introduction to Russian officials. 

 What did that matter ? I was in Rome, and would do 

 as Rome did, so I ate shashlik in the bazaar, alternate 

 nobs of mutton and fat roasted on skewers, one skewer 

 to each mouthful, and drank sherbet out of small incon- 

 venient handleless bowls. It was all eminently in keep- 

 ing with my surroundings, and I would not have had it 

 otherwise. 



I feel that I ought to say something about the other 

 striking ruins of Samarkand, though it has all been 

 said far better than I can say it many times before. I 

 visited them all, of course : the tomb of Timur, the 

 mosque of Shah Zindeh, the mosque and madressah of 

 Bibi Khanum, and even a gigantic cenotaph at some 



