smooth,
straight trails that fortunately lead directly from the caravanserai
eastward. Scores of the shouting, yelling mob race, bare-footed and
bare-legged, over the stones and gravel alongside the bicycle, until I
can put on a spurt and out-distance them, which I take care to do as soon
as practicable, thankful to get away and eat the bread pocketed in
disgust at the caravanserai in the peace and quietude of the desert.

Beyond Abbasabad my road skirts Mazinan Lake to the north, passing
between the slimy mud-flats of the lake shore and the ever-present Elburz
foot-hills, and then through several wholly ruined or partially ruined
villages to Mazinan, where I arrive about sunset, my wheel yet again a
mass of mud, for the Mazinan lake country is a muddy hole in spring. A
drizzling rain ushers in the dusky shades of the evening, as I repair to
the chaparkhana, a wretched hole, in a most dilapidated condition. The
balakhana is little better than being out of doors; the roof leaks like a
colander, the windows are mere unglazed holes in the wall, and the doors
are but little better than the windows. It promises to be a cold,
draughty, comfortless night, and the prospects for supper look gloomy
enough in the light of smoky camel-thorn and no samovar to make a cup of
tea.

Such is the cheerless prospect confronting me after a hard day's run,
when, soon after dark, a man arrives with a thrice-welcome invitation
from a Russian officer, who he says is staying at the caravanserai. The
officer, he says, has pillau, kabobs, wine, plenty of everything, and
would be glad if I would bring my machine and come and accept his
hospitality for the night. Under the circumstances nothing could be more
welcome news than this; and picturing to myself a pleasant evening with a
genial, hospitable gentleman, I take the bicycle down the slippery and
broken mud stairway, and follow my guide through drizzling rain and
darkness, over ditches and through miry byways, to the caravanserai.

The officer is found squatting, Asiatic-like, on his menzil floor, his
overcoat over his shoulders. He is watching his cook broiling kabobs for
his supper. It is a cheery, hopeful prospect, the glowing charcoal fire
sparkling in response to the vigorous waving of half a saddle-flap, the
savory, sizzling kabobs and the carpeted menzil, in comparison with the
dreary tumble-down place I have just left. My first impression of the
officer himself, however, is scarcely so