We were assigned a room in the condemned block on the east of the quadrangle, wherein we spread our rugs and erected our camp beds. It was 26 feet square, with a lofty wooden ceiling, supported by two pillars of the same material. The adjoining apartment was in process of demolition, but, although without a roof, it served admirably as a kitchen, while the flooring provided fuel for our fire. When all was in order we should not have exchanged the results of our improvisation even for the creations of the Cambridge upholsterer, mellowed in the hands of the Cambridge bedmaker; while, as for living, was it not preferable to possess the whole of our scapegrace cook than to share the services of the most virtuous of gyps? Each day as we mounted our staircase, which exactly recalled its sad Cambridge counterparts, I was struck by the resemblance of my new surroundings to those among which I had grown up in the Old Court of Trinity, with the sky and the fountain and the adjacent cloister, where the glory of the foliage and lawn and river is spread in mystery beyond the trellis screens. Even beneath this tropical sun the mind of man has surpassed his difficulties; and just as the Cam has been converted from a melancholy ditch into a brimming waterway, threading a landscape of lawn and forest, so the Kasagh has been impressed into the service of an artificial lake, bordered by shady avenues. Extremely pleasant is the stroll round this spacious basin, which is due to the refinement of Nerses V. (1761-1857). It is situated just outside and south of the cloister; and while from one side the view discloses the dome and a cupola of the cathedral (Fig. 50), on the other it is the vault of Ararat and the pyramid of the Lesser Ararat that are outlined above the soft foreground of water and trees (Fig. 51). It was a pleasure to instance this work to General Frese and my Russian acquaintances as bearing testimony to the sense of security inspired by Russian rule. The cloister and even the bazar are surrounded by walls worthy of a fortress, a relic from the old Persian times. The Russians appear on the scene, and the imprisoned monks disport in the open, which they make to bloom with luscious groves.