MINSINGIRD. 
399 
We reached Minsingird, a distance nominally called twelve sahai^ 
or hours, which are here reckoned by the rate of going of an arabah or cart 
drawn by oxen. The whole of our track from Kars had been covered 
with snow, until we reached the valley of Minsingird, which had none. 
This place is overlooked by an insulated and honey-combed rock, on 
the top of which are the remains of a stone-built castle. I was lodged 
as usual in a large stable, in one corner of which was a place railed off 
for the purposes of habitation, and which in the company of four or 
five buffaloes, and as many cows, I found disagreeably warm. My bed 
was spread upon some planks, the ends of which rested upon heaps of 
dried grass, and after I had been asleep, I was awoke on a sudden by 
the falling of it. An honest buffalo had been feeding upon the grass 
under the head of my bed, which he at length had diminished so much 
in quantity that the planks fell by a natural consequence. 
We departed from Minsingird with the intention of reaching Hassan 
Caleb, but our cattle could only reach Kupri Kieu, an Armenian 
village, close to Korban Kupri, the bridge over the Araxes. 
We changed horses at Hassancaleh, and as I was seated in the post¬ 
master’s room, a poor and decrepid Turk presented me some apples, 
and then sitting down, most philosophically exclaimed Duniah bosh ,— 
the world is nothing; or in other words, all is vanity. On the same 
day we reached Arze Roum, and I paid a visit to the Pasha, who has 
acquired great celebrity among the Turks as a warrior. He was origi¬ 
nally a Pehlivan or prize-fighter ; and having performed some feats of 
valour in the war against Russia, he was made a colonel. From that 
he became a Pasha of two tails, and having been made prisoner by 
the Russians, upon his release, he received an additional tail, and 
was made the Serasker or commander in chief of the Persian 
and Russian frontier, and the seat of his government was established 
at Arze Roum. He sent me a horse gaily caparisoned, attended by 
several servants, to conduct me to his palace, and when I entered the 
room in v/hich he was seated, I found him in a corner of his sopha, 
overwhelmed with pelisses, and the heaps of shawls on his head. He 
appeared perfectly torpid, but I make no doubt if rouzed, he would 
