Save the eggs and the milk for the custard, we brought all these good things from Hamadan, and the cook deserves great credit, for his kitchen has been merely a corner of the post-house yard, his range three or four bricks, and he has _roasted_ his leg of mutton in a saucepan, and sent it to table with delicious gravy; and thus we fare daily while on the road. Some men, even when marching, insist on a hot breakfast on the road itself, of three or four courses, but this is only needful when there are ladies. Dinner over, kalians and coffee are brought. Our beds are made one on each side of the fireplace, but not on the ground, for we have tressel bedsteads, and ten sees us fast asleep. A fertile plain brings us, next morning’s stage, to Kangawar, a large and prosperous village. Here the climate grows warmer. It is a very well-watered district, and the people seem well-to-do. In fact, in Persia, wherever there is water there is prosperity. There is the ruin here of a temple said to have been erected to Diana; nothing seems to be known about it, and it is only memory that tells me that some authority gives it as a temple to Diana. However, the four stone columns, minus their capitals, are still standing; they are united by a mud wall, and form part of a villager’s house. In the swamp in front of the village we go out for snipe; Pierson gets three brace and one _double_ snipe. I manage to get a teal, which I pot from behind some reeds, the snipe being as yet too much for me. I also shoot several snippets, but am disappointed when Pierson tells me to throw them away. I have one cooked in defiance—it is uneatable. We stop two days in Kangawar, and live in a tent. This is a very comfortable one, with double walls, the property of Government, made, so a label on it says, at the school at Jubbulpoor. It is constructed, so another label tells me, for two subalterns. It has a passage a yard wide between the walls, which keeps it cool in summer. We find it chilly at night, and as we have no stove we are unable to light a fire. The second day Pierson gets several double snipe, and I get very wet. On our next march we come upon the Kara-Su (black water) River, and see a valley teeming with bird-life—herons, ducks, geese, what appear to be black swans, cormorants, cranes of various colours, from the big white “leg-leg” with black wings, to small and graceful ones of pure white; mallards, teal, and widgeon. They unfortunately are on the other side of the river, which is unfordable here, in a swamp which extends for miles.