My own caravan from Bushire to Shiraz consisted of three mules, and the only little adventure I had in my ride of 1000 miles took place at the summit of one of the wildest and loneliest rocky ladders that lead to the interior. Here I was accosted by five men, clothed in picturesque rags, each carrying a long knife in his waist-belt, and a long thin muzzle-load ing gun slung over his shoulder. They kept following me for about five minutes, demanding backsheesh for performing the duties, as they said, of road-guards. It was still light, and a more villainous-looking set of fellows I have never yet seen. I told them to clear out of my way, but this they did not at all feel disposed to do. On one of them at last laying hold of my bridle, I gave him a smart crack over the knuckles with a riding-crop I happened to have in my hand. This caused him to relinquish his grasp, but all immediately closed upon me, and as a last resort I drew my revolver from my wallet. This produced the desired effect, for they now fell to the rear, and remained together as if in consultation as to their future movements. I pushed on, and was not again disturbed by the unpleasant attention of such dangerous-looking vagabonds. Next day, whilst crossing the highest of the mountain passes, we found ourselves in a region of snow-crowned hills, and thenceforward to the confines of the Caspian we were never out of sight of white-crested peaks. One is never far from the hills, for Persia is a land of mountains and plains. One vast plain succeeds another, hemmed in on all sides by the everlasting hills, which bound the distant horizon, where mountain rises upon mountain. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.