The stones of the wall are each of the size of an elephant, but cut square, and are so large that fifty men at the present day, could not lift one of them. In the castle are two hundred well terraced houses; close to the southern wall is a large palace, the architectural ornaments of which are not to be found in any other palace in Persia; near to it is a great mosque with a ruined minareh, and a bath built in the Ottoman style, and a fountain. Near the gate of boats opening to the east, is the mosque of Uzdemir-zadeh Osmán Páshá, with some kháns and shops. The suburb outside the castle consists of about a thousand houses, with no imáret, but kháns, mosques and baths. The people get their living by cultivating silk, they are Sunnís and Shafiís, rich men, and fine youths. On the opposite side of the Caspian Sea are the Russian provinces of Heshdek and Kazán; and further on Kipchák and Heihát, where twenty years ago Taissi Sháh, Moyunják Khán, and Kúba Kalmákh Khán with fifty or sixty thousand men wandering about in the steppes, pushed their inroads up to the bank of the Kemúklí river and there killed Gúrgí Mustafa Páshá; these Kalmúks are all Infidels, who have no idea of religion and faith, but are a careless slavish set of people, some of whom now begin to come with Russian merchants to the harbour of Derbend, which is frequented by Chinese, Tátárs, and Russians in great numbers. When it was governed by the Ottomans its annual revenue was two hundred and forty-seven thousand aspers, besides the revenues of the seven Sultáns or sanjak Begs, and the annual sums given to the Prince of Dághistán for the preservation of peace. This is according to the description of Zál Mohammed, made after the conquest of Uzdemir-oghlí Osmán Páshá. The province of Shirván at present consists of seventy jurisdictions, seven khánliks, and twelve Sultánliks. May God bring it back to the possession of the Ottomans! _Pilgrimages._ Yezíd Ben Abd-ul-Melek, son of Atika the daughter of Moavia, came from Damascus with a great army to make war against the heretic rebels (Khavarej); seven hundred moslim martyrs, who were killed on that occasion, are buried outside the western wall at a mile’s distance. Another army came in the time of Heshám Ben Abd-ul-Melek, which conquered the provinces of Dághistán, Kúmúk, Thábserán, Kaiták, and Derbend. The martyrs who fell on this occasion were also buried in this cemetery; their names are written on the tombs in Cufic characters and in Thúlúth writing; the inhabitants of Derbend boast that amongst this crowd of martyrs seventy-five doctors of true tradition are buried. Amongst these tombs some are to be seen with inscriptions in Jellí (great Neskhí) of Ottomans, giving an account of their lives and deaths. _The Pilgrimage of the Forty._