Turkomans riding double on their ill-fed ponies and two-wheeled Persian carts piled high with goods. The latter are exposed for sale in long lines of covered booths, where Hebrew, Persian, and Armenian vendors squat, surrounded by dried fruits, rice from Meshed, coarse beet-sugar from Russia, and rocky almond paste. The fruit would win a first prize at any English show. Nowhere are melons cheaper or more fragrant, apricots and grapes nowhere more choice. The cheap cutlery, trinkets, leather goods, and samovars are much the same as one sees in Russian markets west of the Caspian, but the prices are at least 100 per cent. dearer. The embroidery, shawls, and carpets for which Merv was famed have lost in value and quality since the Russian conquest. Vast is the concourse of Turkomans from all parts of the oasis at these weekly gatherings; but there is far less of the babel of sounds and the eager bargaining than is seen at Indian bazaars. It is in vast crowds that national spirit is unconsciously displayed. If that of Merv be reflected in the thousands of big-boned, slouching Turkomans in sheep-skin hats and flowing garments who flock hither to lay in their weekly supplies, then it is evident that their spirit has been crushed by conquest. [Illustration: RUINS OF OLD MERV] The ruins of the ancient cities which successively bore the name of Merv stand in a dismal plain covered with tamarisk and camels’ thorn ten miles from the modern cantonments. The railway station whence they may be visited is called Bahrām `Alī, after an eighteenth century chieftain who held the neighbouring robber tribes under stern control, until his overthrow by Amīr Murād, the founder of the Bokhāran dynasty. Trim orchards and broad roads surround the halting-place, and on all sides may be seen huge piles of cotton awaiting transport. For Bahrām `Alī is the centre of the Tsar’s private domains, which have of late years received a plentiful supply of water from one of the old irrigation works now restored by imperial enterprise. Leaving this smiling oasis, one enters on a scene of desolation which can be matched only by the environs of Delhi. Like that vast tomb of empires, Old Merv is a series of ruined cities, each built of its predecessors’ materials.[682] The most recent is the citadel so stoutly defended by Bahrām `Alī in 1784. It is an irregular quadrangle of about 250 yards square, surrounded by a wall with circular towers of brick. Within, amid a mass of ruins, is a mosque with a cupola still standing, and in the courtyard of the citadel, at the north-east corner, are the remains of the founder’s palace, a quadrangle of three-storeyed buildings in fair preservation. Passing out of Bahrām `Alī by the eastern portal, one sees, a mile off, two arched recesses standing side by side, conspicuous by their ornamentation of blue enamelled bricks. In front of each is a tombstone of grey marble, showing extracts from the Koran in raised Arabic lettering.