304 FROM GOKTCHAI TO LENKORAN. 



with the scene, and formed with it a tout- ensemble 

 not easily forgotten. Once or twice en route a wild- 

 looking fellow on horseback rode up and inspected 

 us, but, though our driver's nerves were much 

 upset by these visits of inspection, no evil came of 

 them, our visitors probably thinking one such 

 wretched horse as ours was hardly worth the 

 stealing. 



From Salian to Lenkoran would have been an 

 excessively uninteresting drive had it not been for 

 the teeming bird -life on all sides. The nearer we 

 got to the Caspian, the more the fowl increased. 

 At one place we shot splendid Numidian cranes, 

 whose stately forms might frequently be seen. At 

 another flamingoes, white and rosy, tempted us 

 from our tarantasse. In the mist of early morn- 

 ing an eagle, alit by the roadside, almost frightened 

 us by his apparently gigantic proportions ; and 

 even when he flew away, unharmed and but little 

 alarmed by our bullets when, too, we had made 

 all allowance for the exaggerating properties of 

 the mist we could scarcely believe that he be- 

 longed to any known species, so gigantic did he 

 appear. 



In those parts of the journey where the post- 

 road ran through sand-hills near the sea, the noise 

 of the fowl was simply deafening. In the Crimea 

 the varieties of wild ducks are extremely numerous, 

 but here it seemed almost as if there were as 



