The armed crowd advanced at a run; we put ourselves on the supposed danger-side of the caravan. The mules had all stopped when the drivers ran away, and to our delight we found that the armed men were merely some villagers who had fled to the mountains rather than pay excessive taxes. These poor fellows begged us to intercede with the Governor of Ispahan for them on our arrival, which we promised to do. Our muleteers, seeing there was no fighting, now returned; we put up our revolvers, and on we went. We did not pass through Khonsar, which is off the road. That night we arrived at a small village which had a quantity of warm springs. So unsophisticated were the natives that, having no other shelter to give us, they suggested that we, like Mussulman travellers, should put up in the mosque. To this we did not object, and had a very good resting-place. This was a very extraordinary occurrence, as villagers are generally very bigoted; but I fancy these people did not really understand that we were not Mahommedans. The next stage was Lilliane, an Armenian village; the people were apparently prosperous; they wore the dress of the ancient Armenians, or Feridan costume. Feridan is a collection of villages, most of which are Armenian, in the neighbourhood of Ispahan. The priest put me up; he had been to Bombay, and seemed a decent fellow. He was an old man, and told me that, were it not for their secluded position, they should be much oppressed. The men and boys seemed very boorish; the women were clad in the peculiar ancient costume referred to. Cylinders of pasteboard were swathed in chintz of various colours, and worn as head-coverings. These hats, if they may be so called, were ornamented with strings of silver coins; they wore long trousers, the bottoms of which were in some cases elaborately embroidered. It is these embroideries, called naksh, that are exhibited in the Persian collection in the South Kensington Museum. At one time they were part of the universal indoor dress of the Persian women; each bride worked herself a pair during her girlhood, and they are said to have employed three, four, or even five years in the labour. The figures are flowers, generally roses, worked in diagonal rows in fine silk on muslin; there is no filling in, it is _all stitching_.