FROM THE GLEN OF MAZENGUTT. 
659 
ancient and modern, completed their barbarian array ; while the 
pale sun, gleaming from a wintry sky on the burnish of their 
arms, and dark countenances, shewed much legible writing in 
the iron furrows of the latter. They reined back their spirited 
animals as we emerged from our den-like abodes. The ruined 
fortress of the robber-chief rose immediately over them, grey, 
fissured, and under the deep shadow of the higher mountains ; 
forming altogether a living picture of bold and savage objects, 
so mingled with some of the grandest combinations in nature, 
as never to be effaced from my memory. We started soon after 
sun-rise; and having crossed the great chasm of Mazengutt, 
began to ascend the mountain to the south-west, by a pass of 
upland vales, intricate glens, and the threatened tortuous ravines 
full of terrors. In the more open parts, the yellow sterile face 
of the scene was animated by trains of bullocks, dragging hun¬ 
dreds of felled fir-trees down the valleys from the neighbouring 
wooded heights. These convoys were for Arzeroom, and for safety 
generally move in considerable bodies, small numbers seldom 
escaping pillage ; that is to say, the cattle stolen, and the drivers 
stripped. All of which depredations are commonly laid to the charge 
of the Courdish tribes, under the nominal jurisdiction of Erivan ; 
indeed, parties of mountaineers from that province, often making 
excursions thus far, give too ready a cloak for every species of 
rapine wrought by native thieves, being laid to their border name. 
After proceeding most warily for some time towards the 
south-east, with our videttes in advance on the higher grounds 
of the road, we came in view of the pyramidal summit of the 
Kuss Dagh; and in about an hour reached the river Zebeen, 
the source of which we had seen near the old mouldering khaun 
in the Saganloo mountains. A few yards from its brink, at this 
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