468 TRANSCAUCASIA. 



and shown a large room, ill-provided, as Russian rooms 

 generally are, with, sleeping accommodation, but otherwise 

 comfortable. We spent the evening in sauntering about 

 the place, which is so overshadowed by trees and rocks 

 that scarcely any sunshine can reach it — a circumstance 

 which, in the hot climate of Georgia, has contributed 

 greatly to its reputation as a pleasant summer retreat for 

 those who do not require any very violent course of 

 mineral waters. 



At Patigorslv at least two-thirds of the society are real 

 invalids ; here we saw scarcely any, and the Russian young 

 ladies who raced about the gardens, and chatted together 

 in excellent English, afforded a more pleasing spectacle 

 than the sickly officers and decrepit old men of the Cis- 

 Caucasian Spa. An excellent military band, by far the 

 best we heard in the Caucasus, played in the gardens 

 about sunset, and we had the satisfaction of hearing the 

 'Mabel Waltzes' (the popularity of which seems unbounded 

 in Russia) and the overture to ' The Huguenots' performed 

 in a masterly style. A question seemed likely to arise as to 

 the possibility of procuring horses in the morning to go 

 on to Achaltzich, but, owing to an officer for whom some 

 were ordered being unable to start, we succeeded in getting 

 the requisite number. 



August olst. — Thg first stage is a long one of twenty-six 

 versts (seventeen miles) and the road is extraordinarily hilly. 

 The morning was lovely, and we fully enjoyed the pretty 

 scenery of the winding valley, where the Kur flowed be- 

 tween hillsides clothed with thick oak and fir-forests, from 

 amongst which rise the ruins of old castles, commanding 

 in former days this entrance to Georgia. We were re- 

 minded at every turn of the Jura, to which, in its relation 

 to the higher neighbouring chain, the Georgianhill-country 

 may, mutatis mutandis^ be very fairly compared. The 



