SERDASHT. 
475 
and took a direction N. 60° E. over the tops and along the 
sides of the branching hills I have just mentioned. Thus tra¬ 
velling downward, we gradually left the snow behind, and in 
an hour and a half reached a small and rapid stream flowing- 
north-west, which we crossed. This brought us on a lower 
stretch of mountains running to the south-west, and the cha¬ 
racter of our way varied at almost every turn. Sometimes 
we passed over cultivated tracts, their brown furrowed sides 
shewing traces of the plough ; at others, through thick ragged 
woods, nearly leafless, or amidst wild ravines washed by roar¬ 
ing torrents. For full two hours, on a tolerably easy descent, 
we traversed this changing scenery ; but at the expiration of 
that time, arrived at a very steep declivity, leading through a 
chasm deeply cleft into the mountain. Its bottom was clay, 
and rendered slippery by the unceasing moisture of hundreds 
of little rills for ever trickling down its sides. This road was 
often treacherous to our horses’ feet, while the gloom of the 
passage, with the chilling and mournful monotony of the constant 
trickling of the water over the rocks, made it rather a melan¬ 
choly ride of nearly three miles, the extent of this almost 
subterraneous glen ; which, however, brought us out upon the 
edge of a small plain, bordered on the opposite side by the town 
of Serdasht. It was to be our menzil for the remainder of the 
day ; and taking rather a quicker pace towards it, we gladly 
arrived there after a severe march of six hours, and over a 
distance of between ten and eleven miles. 
The place is walled and towered with burnt brick; while a few 
wretched-looking houses, with gardens of no better promise, 
make up a straggling kind of suburb. In our approach to the 
gate of the town, (for it possessed only one,) and while at some 
3 p 2 
