It was a novel sensation to arrive in the evening at a miserable shed, a barn, a stable, mostly without any windows or other ventilation, termed a “han,” in which oxen, buffaloes, and camels were quartered, and to be told that we were expected to pass the night there. But such was destined to be, with few exceptions, our nightly experience for the next few weeks. On emerging from our stable one morning, long before sunrise, we could scarcely see a yard in front of us. We were surrounded by a thick mist. It rose from an encampment of camels, buffaloes, and horses immediately facing us. It appeared that they had arrived in the evening after us, and, finding the “han” occupied by our party, had camped out all night in the open. The bitter cold had acted in the manner described, causing clouds of steam to rise from the bodies of the animals. Our first station of any note was a place called Gumysch Hanè, a name which denoted that silver mines were or had been worked in the neighbourhood. Here we changed our carriages for saddle-horses, with which next morning we crossed the Zigana Pass—6000 feet high and one of the most perilous sections of our journey now that in the winter, owing to the snow, the road, at its best little better than a bridle-path, was narrowed to the breadth of a mere wooden plank, with yawning ravines on the off-side of us. It was here that we met the most thrilling experiences of our whole journey—namely, the encountering of caravans of mules, camels, and droves of sheep proceeding in the opposite direction. We were told that only a short time previously on this road a number of camels connected together by ropes had lost their footing and been precipitated into the abyss below. Here I cannot resist the temptation of quoting a passage describing Professor Vambéry’s experience over the same road, as it exactly tallies with my own: “On our way we met a long line of over-loaded mules descending amidst the wild screams of their Persian drivers. It is a rare sight to watch them advancing with the utmost care, without any accident upon the slippery path cut into the rock, scarcely two spans wide, flanked by the bottomless abyss. And yet it is a very unusual thing for a mule to be precipitated into the abyss yawning along the path. If ever it happens it is in winter. The danger is greatest when two caravans happen to meet face to face. In order to avoid such an encounter big bells, heard at a great distance, are used by them, warning the caravans to keep out of each other’s way. The continuously steep ascent lasted over four hours. There is hardly a worse road in all Asia, yet this is the only commercial road which connects Armenia with Persia, nay, Central Asia with the West. During the summer hundreds of thousands of these animals are traversing this route, going and coming, loaded with the products of Asia and the manufactures of Europe.”[6] Footnote 6: “Arminius Vambéry: Life and Adventures.” London, 1890: pp. 38–39.