By daily excursions among the sloping vine-clad hills I soon made myself familiar with Kakheti, the garden of Georgia; at Kodalo I had shared the munificent hospitality of the Andronikovs, at Bakurtsikhe that of the Vachnadzes; but I had never been in the wild country beyond the Alazana, and it was with pleasure that I accepted the invitation of the Princes Vachnadze to accompany them on their yearly visit to their estates at Kartuban, on the River Kabalo, at the foot of the mountains on the other side of the plain. Accordingly, on a certain bright summer morning our cavalcade might have been seen winding down the steep main street of Signakh. The first halting-place was to be Bakurtsikhe, seventeen versts from Signakh, where we had been invited to meet a large company of Kakhetian squires and ladies at dinner. Our path, for some miles after leaving the town, lay in the dry bed of a torrent. The remembrance of the wild, beautiful scenery of that narrow gorge still fills me with delightful emotions. It was the scene of so many pleasant rides--in the fierce heat of the noonday sun, in the cool of evening, after midnight on stormy nights, when we had returned homewards drenched with rain, our path illumined only by dazzling flashes of lightning. As we picked our way among the stones we met many a courteous gentleman, most of them clad in the same Circassian garb as ourselves, but not a few, especially the older men, in the true national garb--a short tunic, with long flaps of cloth hanging from the shoulders; a dress said to resemble the ancient Polish costume. Each raised his tall papakh of Astrakhan fur, and, with graceful bow, saluted us, after the manner of the country, with the word Gamardjwéba, which is, being interpreted, "I wish thee the victory," to which we answered Gaguimardjos--"May God grant thee the victory." These salutations are as eloquent as a dozen volumes of history. I never heard them without thinking of the sad but glorious past of the Georgian kingdom, nobly holding its own, unaided, and witnessing for Christ and His Cross against all the hosts of Islam, performing prodigies of valour that would have added to the fame of Greece or Rome. God grant thee the victory, brave Georgia!