FINANCES. 157 



contempt, and joined heartily in our supper. 

 His friends and co-religionists of Gebi, instead 

 of appearing shocked at the laxity of his 

 religious principles, seemed to admire him as 

 a being of superior culture, for whom of 

 course the laws concerning feasts and fasts 

 were not meant to be so bindmg as they were 

 for themselves. 



After supper we had to go seriously into 

 money matters, and we were obliged to yield 

 to the unpleasant conviction that unless we 

 could obtain money at once we should have 

 to return to Kutais. It seemed a risky thing 

 at first sight to trust our mterpreter with any 

 large sum, but there was no other way out of 

 our difficulty ; and to go back to Kutais, to be 

 stifled by the heat and driven mad by the 

 difficulties of making a fresh start, was not to 

 be thought of. So we gave him thirty pounds 

 in circular notes and letters to some friends of 

 ours, and having secured his native passjDort 



