150 ARAEAT. 



Paul if we had come to arrange for the construction of a 

 railroad to Tabreez, and hoped we should make it pass 

 through Maraud, and that it would soon be begun. One 

 was scarcely prepared for so keen an appreciation of the 

 advantages of quick communication in this remote Persian 

 town. 



June 3rd. — We rode down to Djulfa, and as we passed 

 the defile in the range, that shuts in on the south the 

 Araxes valley, the rock-tower on the Russian side looked 

 very imposing. We were already descending towards the 

 Araxes, when we noticed a black cloud gathering on the 

 mountains behind us, similar to, but more dense and 

 inky than, that which had pursued us on the Erivan and 

 Nakhitchevan road ten days previously. Feeling that 

 Djulfa, the scene of our inhospitable treatment and of 

 Tucker's illness, was not a place to arrive at drenched to 

 the skin, we increased our pace, and reached a village 

 about three miles from our destination, still uncaught. 

 The storm was gaining fast, and looked so bad that we set 

 off at a gallop. The race that followed could only be 

 described by a mixture of the styles of Mayne Eeid and 

 De Quincey, to which I am wholly unequal. The ground 

 was tolerably flat, the storm coming up rather on our 

 fiank. On making a sudden dip over the bank that 

 bounds the actual trench of the Araxes, we saw that we 

 were too late. The dust-cloud, which rides on the front 

 of these steppe-storms, had crept round and cut us off 

 from Djulfa. In a moment it was upon us, borne along 

 by a wind which swept twigs and tufts of grass along the 

 ground, and nearly blew me out of the saddle. The air 

 was so thick that I could only see the two horses nearest 

 me — one a riderless animal the postboy was taking back 

 with him. Our beasts seemed to dread the storm as much 

 as we did, and galloped at the top of their speed. In a 



