ABSTRACT
PERSIA has at all times been a difficult country to get to, and Russia was at that time difficult to cross. In the custom house at Batum all our luggage was subjected to a careful examination, notwithstanding the official character of my journey to Teheran. Special umbrage was taken at our saddles, bridles and felt saddle cloths, and also at our blankets and quilts. In vain did I try to show that these articles were indispensable for an overland journey in a country without trains, carriages or hotels. I was shown a list of the objects which were considered travelling requisites in Russia, and saddles, etc., were not among them. I wired to the German Ambassador in St. Petersburg, but long before things were put right through his energetic intervention, we had to leave for Baku to catch a Russian mail-boat to Anzali on the Persian shore of the Caspian Sea. While we were rocking in front of this little village, we had time to admire the snow-clad mountains of Tãlish and Gilan, whose lower part was clad with luxurious forests and merged into the emerald green strip of land that fringes the southern shore of the Caspian.
