Issuing again from this minor trough and regaining the principal artery, we may extend our ride to the fortress enclosure of the monastery last mentioned--a curious receptacle for a sanctuary dedicated to the mother of Christ (Fig. 147). In spite of its massive walls, it was rifled by Kurds during the last Russo-Turkish war; and you may still see the imprints of the large stones which they hurled at the door communicating with the treasury adjoining the apse of the church. The ignorant peasant who was priest in charge informed us that the cloister had been in possession of charms wherewith to raise the dead to life; with these, too, the marauders had made off. A sheep was bleating in the yard; his fat tail had been bitten off by a wolf, while he grazed upon the sward outside. Wolves enter the streets of the town during winter and have been known to carry away the dogs. Returning by the right bank of the Bitlis river, we may thread our way through the crowded bazars. They are nothing better than roofed passages, narrow and low. An old Khan with a fine doorway in the Arab style, adorned with the figures of two snarling lions, varies the monotony of the shabby booths. The Arab façade with inlays of marble of the Sherifieh mosque adjoins the masonry of the bridge over the western confluent. We were unable to penetrate within the walls of the principal mosque, at the foot of the castle; but it did not appear to offer interesting features. There is a persistent tradition that several of the mosques in Bitlis were formerly Christian churches. A question of still greater interest, but which I regret I have failed to elucidate, attaches to the age of the various edifices. One cannot help remarking a strong family resemblance between them, all being markedly under the influence of the Arab style. They are evidently the outcome of a period or periods of building activity, which I have been unable to locate in the history of the city.