'Through Persia on a side-saddle' [‎207] (242/360)

THROUGH THE DESERT TO BAMPUR AND PAHRA 207
Two days after this hard march we passed through a
charming region to which it seemed absurd to give the
name of desert. We started from Abi Kishkin, the meet
ing of three long valleys, bounded by magnificent lime
stone peaks, above which Basman's snowy cone towered
in the sunshine, and our guide led us along the sandy bed
of a river amid a jungle of grasses and tamarisks, high
concrete cliffs forming the banks of the stream. It was
by no means a first-class road, as we had to pick our way
in and out among big granite blocks, crossing and recross-
ing the water every few moments, and it was impossible to
remain in our saddles, for we could not let our horses leap
from one slippery boulder to another with riders on their
backs. So perforce we dismounted, and I made up my
mind that the boots I was wearing must be sacrificed, as
the agility of a chamois would be needed to keep dryshod
in such a place, the sacrifice being by no means a joke in a
land where it is impossible to replace such articles. On
and on we stumbled, jumping from stone to stone, crossing
patches of sand saturated with moisture, in and out ot
masses of wet yellow grass, until, after some hours, we
came to a dead halt, owing to the mouth of the valley
being blocked up with boulders piled one above the other
in mad confusion, as if Titans had had a game of play and
had left their giant missiles all heaped up here. The
guide frankly confessed that he had lost the track—there
never had been one visible to my uninitiated eye—and he
clambered up the concrete cliff and disappeared from view,
hoping to fall in with some of our camels, which were, we
fervently trusted, progressing under more efficient guid
ance than was vouchsafed to us.
After a long wait he reappeared, and announced that we