A people of Cyclopean walls, embossed shields and chariots, they would almost seem to have belonged to the race of giants, preceding the evolution of fox-like man. I must not close this chapter and dismiss the memories of the paradise of Van without bestowing some little space upon the surroundings of the city, which abundantly justify the Armenian proverb. The governing feature of the nearer landscape is the lofty parapet of Mount Varag, distant from the citadel some eight miles in an easterly direction and nearly ten miles from the margin of the lake. The plain rises gradually beyond the limits of field and garden to meet and mingle with those slopes. Spurs connect the mountain with the irregular hill mass on the north of the suburbs, which in its totality appears to be known under the name of Zemzem Dagh. Like Varag itself, these hills are composed of a hard limestone; and their south-westerly extremity is signalised by a very bold, detached crag, standing forth like a sentinel (Fig. 133, and see the plan). This portion of the mass is known as Ak Köpri, which means in Turkish "the white bridge." That is the name of a straggling quarter, inhabited by Mussulmans, on the north side of the little river and close to the crag. [108] The stream itself is also called Ak Köpri; and, coming from Van gardens, we crossed it by a little bridge. Standing close to the crag, which we reached after a short ride, the view ranged widely in all directions except that of the cliffs at our back. Looking west and south we had the great plain before us, bounded only at an interval of many miles by low hills circling from Varag into the lake in front of the distant barrier of the Kurdish mountains. Turning round, we commanded a view of uncultivated flats, extending several miles to another line of bare hills ending on the west in a crag, called Kalajik. The only trace of verdure in that landscape were the gardens of the village of Shahbagh. But the outlines of the promontories, the blue lake, the distant fabrics of Nimrud and Sipan, composed into a picture it would be difficult to forget.