ARZ-ROUM TO AM ASIA. 
Ml 
fellow’s strains, whenever he attempted to renew them, were afterwards 
stopped by the joint force of all his comrades. 
The people of Isker Sou informed me, that for six months of the 
year the snow lies on the ground. The night indeed which w r e passed 
in their village was so sensibly cold that all our warmest clothes were 
brought into use, before we could get ourselves tolerably comfortable. 
In a general view of our route, I should think that we had been rising 
for some time. The country was in a state of internal warfare, which 
however did not interfere with the passage of strangers. In the village 
there was then from Janik one of Jusuff Pacha’s Tuffenchee Bashees , 
or captains, who with fifty followers was feeding at the expence of the 
peasantry. Ciiappan Oglu was the principal object of terror in the 
neighbourhood; his troops had lately fired the Bazar of Niksar , 
which is under the jurisdiction of Haznadar Oglu, Governor of 
Janik . 
4th. of July. From Isker Sou we went to Niksar . We were seven 
hours on the road on a bearing of West, which, from the unequal sur¬ 
face of the country, may be reckoned at twenty-one miles. About one 
mile and a half from Isker Sou we came to a wooden bridge over a 
small stream, which is the termination of the Government of Arz-roum; 
when therefore a Pacha is appointed, the ceremony of sacrificing is per¬ 
formed at this spot. After this we passed several villages on all sides, 
but totally abandoned by their inhabitants, who had taken refuge in the 
different countries against the depredations of the Delhis , and the occa¬ 
sional visits of the soldiers of Ciiappan Oglu. There is a village im¬ 
mediately at the pass (where we entered the mountains); and here com¬ 
menced a series of mountain scenety, of the wildest and most roman¬ 
tic character. No description is adequate to paint the brilliancy and 
luxuriance of vegetation, and the picturesque forms of this region; 
and few imaginations are sufficiently fertile to supply the idea of a 
spring in these mountains. Trees of every denomination grow here in 
the wildest profusion, whilst their roots are embalmed by the odour of 
