After a belated luncheon at the staff mess, following on this long programme, we had to hurry off accompanied by Savitzky and his staff to our railway-car. All the officers and a goodly number of the rank and file in Sarikamish seemed to have collected at the station to give us a rousing send-off, making it evident that our visit had been much appreciated. This was not unnatural. Here were Allies fighting in a region far removed from the principal theatres of war in which the armies of the Entente were engaged, and they were with justice desirous that their efforts should not remain wholly unknown. Like Off, Sarikamish conveyed a very favourable impression of the working of the Transcaucasian legions under the supreme leadership of the Grand Duke Nicholas, of whom officers all spoke with enthusiasm, and whose personality undoubtedly counted for much amongst the impressionable moujik soldiery. What one had seen in these forward situations inspired confidence in the future. Nor was that confidence misplaced, for the Russian forces in Armenia were to achieve great triumphs ere 1916 was out. We had hoped to cross the Caucasus from Tiflis to Vladikavkas by the great military road over the Dariel Pass, but the staff would not hear of it, as there was still some risk from avalanches and as the route was not properly open. We had a farewell luncheon at the palace, and I had a long talk on military questions with the Grand Duke beforehand, at which he entrusted me with special messages to Lord Kitchener and Sir W. Robertson, and expressed an earnest desire for close co-ordination between his forces in Persia and ours in Mesopotamia. News had arrived of the repulse of the Kut Relief Force at Sannaiyat after its having made a promising beginning at Hannah, so that there was no disguising the fact that little hope remained of saving Townshend's force. I did not know what course might be adopted by our Government in this discouraging theatre of war, assuming that Kut fell; but there could be no doubt that co-ordination was desirable, as we were bound to hold on to the Shatt-el-Arab and the oil-fields, whatever happened; it was therefore quite safe to promise that we would do our best. Having made our farewells, our little party proceeded straight from Tiflis to Moscow.