TROOPS OX THE MAECH. 115 



decorations, could not expect, and did not meet with, even 

 tlie commonest civility and thought ourselves lucky when 

 the surly postmaster, with a very bad grace, accorded us 

 permission to roll ourselves up in our rugs on the floor of 

 his room — quarters which we shared with a huge dog con- 

 scious of fleas, and consequently provokingly restless during 

 the dark hours. 



3Tay 21st. — We were awoke from sleep, if the uneasy 

 rest we obtained deserved the name, by a most horrible 

 discord, some idea of which might be obtained by hiring 

 itinerant performers on the bagpipe and barrel-organ to 

 play different tunes simultaneously. The soldiery were 

 starting, and their drum-and-fife band was cheering them 

 on the road. I imagine that the dregs of the Russian 

 army are kept in Trans- Caucasia ; anything more vnretched 

 and slovenly than the uniforms, marching, and general 

 appearance of these men we had never seen even in Turkey, 

 but the work in which they had been employed might 

 account partially for their unsoldierly aspect, as some of 

 the Russian troops we saw afterwards were xerj different. 



We changed our direction to-day from east-south-east to 

 nearly due south, and entered a valley among the hills 

 which separate Georgia from Armenia, the basin of the 

 Kirr from that of the Araxes. Half an hour was spent in 

 passing the troops and their long trains of baggage-wag- 

 gons. The road was narrow and bad, and our driver timid, 

 but at last we left even the vanguard behind. Our course 

 lay along the banks of the stream we had crossed over- 

 night, which were ornamented by magnificent forest-trees. 

 The morning was lovely, soft clouds were clearing off the 

 hills on the south, while the snowy crest of the Eastern 

 Caucasus ran along the northern horizon, rising beyond 

 the Karaja steppes. The next time we saw it was from 

 the slopes of Ai*arat. The depression in which the river 



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