616 
ARARAT IN A STORM. 
in high dispute with the head of the Mehman Khanah, but our 
interference soon made peace, and we all retired quietly to repose. 
October 22d. — About six miles to the south-west of Nack- 
shivan, and close to the bank of the Aras, stands the fort of 
Abbas-abad; first constructed under the direction of General 
Gardanne, when the French embassy was in this country; and 
since improved by Captain Monteith, our own brave country¬ 
man. A detachment from the Nackshivan regiment always 
keeps post there. We left our menzil in that town to-day at 
a very late hour, in consequence of delay in getting horses ; but 
at length the proper number being produced, we set off at two 
o’clock in the afternoon. When we had some time slowly gained 
upon the long uneven ground that slopes down into the wide 
Arasian plain, we arrived at the point where the sublime moun¬ 
tain of the ark is commonly first discernible in marching hither 
from the south ; but all the heavens to the north-west were co¬ 
vered with clouds, which continued gathering forward in such 
obscuring density, that hardly a point of the whole line of 
mountains in that direction was visible. But as we advanced, 
the collected storm burst over our heads in torrents of heavy 
rain, accompanied by a violent gale of wind ; while at intervals 
the dark obscurity on our left was broken by the most vivid and 
broad streams of lightning, followed by long and reverberating 
thunder; in the course of the tempest, the black veil was rent 
that enwrapped the head of stupendous Ararat, and I beheld the 
mountain under the sublimest circumstances. The clouds broke 
from before it, not gradually, but seemed to divide with such ve¬ 
locity as though some sudden shock from heaven had hurled them 
down its awful sides. The sun was not far from setting, and his 
oblique and golden rays, darting through the melting obscurity, 
