in-door costume of the Persian female.  “She is a beautiful dancer,” says her husband, admiringly, “I wish it were possible for you to see her dance this evening; bat it isn’t; Eosie herself wouldn’t mind, but it would be pretty certain to leak out, and Miana being a rather fanatical place, my life wouldn’t be worth that much,” and the Khan carelessly snapped his fingers.  Supper is brought up to the telegraph station.  Prince Assabdulla is invited, and comes round with his servant bearing a number of cucumbers and a bottle of arrack; the Prince, being a genuine Mohammedan, is forbidden by his religion to indulge; consequently he consumes the fiery arrack in preference to some light and harmless native wine; such is the perversity of human nature.

Two princes and a khan are cantering (not khan-tering) alongside the bicycle as I pull out eastward from Miana.  They accompany me to the foot-hills approaching the Koflan Koo Pass, and wishing me a pleasant journey, turn their horses’ heads homeward again.  Reaching the pass proper, I find it to be an exceedingly steep trundle, but quite easy climbing compared with a score of mountain passes in Asia Minor, for the surface is reasonably smooth, and toward the summit is an ancient stone causeway.  A new and delightful experience awaits me upon the summit of the pass; the view to the westward is a revelation of mountain scenery altogether new and novel in my experience, which can now scarcely be called unvaried.  I seem to be elevated entirely above the surface of the earth, and gazing down through transparent, ethereal depths upon a scene of everchanging beauty.  Fleecy cloudlets are floating lazily over the valley far below my position, producing on the landscape a panoramic scene of constantly changing shadows; through the ethery depths, so wonderfully transparent, the billowy gray foothills, the meandering streams fringed with green, and Miana with its blue-domed mosques and emerald gardens, present a phantasmagorical appearance, as though they themselves were floating about in the lower strata of space, and undergoing constant transformation.  Perched on an apparently inaccessible crag to the north is an ancient robber stronghold commanding the pass; it is a natural fortress, requiring but a few finishing touches by man to render it impregnable in the days when the maintenance of robber strongholds were possible.  Owing to its walls and battlements being chiefly erected by nature, the Persian peasantry call it the Perii-Kasr, believing it to have been built by fairies.  While descending the eastern slope, I surprise a gray lizard almost as large as a rabbit, basking in the sunbeams; he briskly scuttles off into the rocks upon being disturbed.