Tiflis Frontispiece Maps of Transcaucasian Railway and Military Road To face page 1 A Georgian Wrestler 30 Saint Nina 40 Ananur 46 Dariel Fort and Ruins of Tamara's Castle 62 Dariel 64 Vladikavkaz 66 An Arba 73 A Street in Signakh 80 Georgian National Costume 84 The City Wall, Telav 108 Queen Tamara 114 Irakli II 124 Rustaveli 139 Prince Ilia Chavchavadze 150 Prince Ivané Machabeli 153 Bishop Gabriel of Kutaïs 154 Map of Georgia At the end. THE KINGDOM OF GEORGIA. BATUM TO TIFLIS. One morning in April, 1887, after a five days' passage from Odessa, we entered the harbour at Batum. Batum (Hôtel Imperial, Hôtel de France, Hôtel d'Europe) is a town of 10,000 inhabitants, mostly Georgians; it consists of an ancient Asiatic quarter, dirty and tumble-down looking, and a European one only seven years old. Its situation at the foot of the mountains is lovely beyond all description. The place has a decidedly "Far West" look about it, everything seems half-finished; the streets are broad and, with a few exceptions, unpaved, the depth of the mud varies from three or four inches to half a yard, heaps of rotting filth furnish food for numerous pigs, and in the best thoroughfares ducks find convenient lakes on which to disport themselves. I took an early opportunity of presenting myself at the British Vice-Consulate, a small, two-storey cottage, the lower half of which is of brick, the upper of corrugated iron sheets. Mr. Demetrius R. Peacock, the only representative of British interests in the Caucasus, is a man whose services deserve fuller recognition. It would be hard to find a post where more diplomatic tact is required, yet he contrives to make himself respected and admired by all the many races with which he is in daily contact. Mr. Peacock was born in Russia, and has spent most of his life in that empire, but he is nevertheless a thorough Englishman. In Tiflis I heard a good story about him. On one occasion the French Consul-General jokingly said to him, "Why, Peacock, you are no Englishman, you were born in Russia." To which our representative replied, "Our Saviour was born in a stable, but for all that He did not turn out a horse."