THROUGH ASIA 
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who had been domiciled in the town quite as long as 
Adam Ignatieff. A Dutchman by birth, he had been 
twenty-five years in Asia, spoke twelve different languages, 
and followed closely and with interest the affairs of the 
world ; he was in short a man of wide culture, endowed 
with no small share of talent — in this respect the exact 
opposite of Adam Ignatieff He made his home in a 
Hindu caravanserai, a miserable hovel without windows, 
and lived in a state of the greatest poverty, apparently 
long ago forgotten by his friends in Europe, for it was 
seltlom, if ever, that he received any letters. It was 
however a real pleasure to talk to him. He was both 
amusing and ready witted, sang French songs with the 
same verve that he recited his Latin masses, and was a 
thorouo-h orio-inal, if ever there was one. To see him 
striding at a smart pace through the Mohammedan 
bazaars, with his long cloak, his broad-brimmed hat, his 
staff, his long beard, and his big spectacles, always put 
me in mind of a greyfriar monk. Solitary, solitary, 
solitary — such was the burden of his life’s song. A 
solitary man, he recited punctually every day the masses 
which none came to listen to; solitary he sat on the 
platform beside the door of his hovel and read, heedless 
of the bustle of the caravans that came and went ; solitary 
he dressed the scanty fare which his poverty permitted 
him to eat ; solitary he wandered about the roads of an 
evening — always and everywhere a solitary, lonely being. 
It was always a pleasure to me when 1 fell in with him. 
Many an hour we sat together philosophizing over life, for 
I too was just as lonely a man as he. 
There was also a third missionary in the town, a 
Mohammedan, who had been converted to Christianity 
and baptized by the name of Johannes or John. He had 
studied the Koran in Erzerum in Turkish Armenia, and 
from the minarets of that city cried to the Faithful, “ La 
illaha il Allah, Mohammedek rasul Ullah" (There is no 
God but Allah, and Mohammed Is His Prophet). After 
being converted to Christianity, he spent two years at 
a mi.ssion school in Sweden. At the time of my visit 
