118 THE PERSIAN POST-ROAD. 



new road, above the line of the old, which was almost 

 covered with the fragments sent down, amongst which 

 we had to ]3ick our way under a desultory fii-e of small 

 stones from above. The watershed between the Kur and 

 the Araxes is here a broad grassy ridge, on which the 

 snow still lay in patches ; the rich herbage has given the 

 name of the ' Echak Meidan,' or 'donkey's pasturage,' to the 

 pass, from the custom of wayfarers to reward their beasts, 

 after the labour of the ascent, by turning them out to graze. 

 It does not seem to command much view. For some distance 

 we bore to the right, with but little descent, until presently 

 as much of the big Gokcha Lake as the mists did not en- 

 shroud came into sight. Size seemed to be its chief merit ; 

 there was not a tree to be seen, the ground had a dull 

 and sodden appearance after the heavy rains, and the 

 surrounding mountains, though many of them are 10,000 

 feet in height, produced but little effect from being seen 

 over the broad surface of a lake, itself 6,000 feet above 

 the sea-level. The day was very unfavourable, and the low 

 clouds, which swept rapidly across the landscape, added 

 to its grim and desolate character. Here, as elsewhere, 

 we noticed the great difference between the northern and 

 southern slopes of the Anti-Caucasian chain. All the valleys 

 facing northwards, towards the Kur, are full of luxuriant 

 vegetation ; while the southern slopes, falling to the Araxes, 

 are always bare, burnt, and arid in summer, and swamps in 

 ^ the rainy season. Tucker's horse evidently had a dissipated 

 owner ; it made a dead halt at every drinking-shop on the 

 road, and its misdemeanours culminated at a village just 

 below the pass, where no persuasion could get the brute past 

 a well-known halting- place. It was not a pleasant spot to 

 dismount, for the mud was deep ; and finally, I had to 

 return, to withdraw ignominiously my friend and his mis- 

 guided beast from the scene of temptation. Unavailing 

 as the hunting-whip he always carried had just proved, it 



