My friends among the English colony at Teheran gave me several wise admonitions, among which were, that I was never to travel during the day on account of the heat, but to start just at sunset, by which I might make two stations before I halted; I was also to look out for myself, as there were numerous brigands on the road, who would not scruple to strip me of everything I possessed. I followed their advice for the first few stages; but, as the rocks retain the heat, I think the discomfort of night-travel is greater than that of day. Besides, the drowsiness was overpowering, and I was constantly in danger of falling from my horse. The landscape had no interest; the mountains appeared but shapeless masses, and the plains were vague and oppressively silent. I reached the salt desert of Persia, after a ride over country which steadily became more sterile and waterless. The fervour of that tract was intense. My thermometer indicated 129° Fahr. Yet this terrible tract, with its fervid glow and its expanse of pale yellow sand almost at white heat, was far more bearable by day than a night ride through it would have been--for, though I could distinguish nothing but a quivering vapour, the strange forms of the mirage were more agreeable than the monotonous darkness. * * * * * Then follows a graphic picture of Ispahan, where he spent a week, and then onwards, ever onwards, riding through oven heat. * * * * * At Kûmishah, I invited myself to pass the night in the telegraph station, for there was nobody at home. When evening came, I made my bed on the house-top, whence I had a good view of the town and of the myriad of mud towers, of acres of tomb-stones, and lion sphynxes. And there I dropped to sleep with the clear heaven for my canopy. At Yezdikhast I had to spend the day; there were no horses, but, at 4 A.M., the relay arrived and away I sped, to the ruins of Pasargadæ. Inclining a little towards the right, I came to a group of low and greyish hills, on the most southward of which I caught a glimpse of a whitish stone wall. Riding up to it, I found it to be a marble platform, or, rather, a marble wall, which encased the hill. The natives call it Solomon’s Throne, and on it once stood the Castle of Pasargadæ. To commemorate the overthrow of the Babylonian Empire, Cyrus the Great, in the year 557 B.C., caused to be erected on it a fort, or castle, containing a Holy Place, whither he went to worship, and where his successors were wont to be inaugurated as Kings of Persia. * * * * * From Pasargadæ Stanley rides to Persepolis, and here he lingers amid the ruins, for he loves to dream of and reconstruct the mighty Past. * * * * * I slept in the first portal of Persepolis, all night. The only food I could get was wafer bread and plenty of milk. * * * * *