Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/189

 Uiz-bashi. Here we had a chance for forty winks — not more, as we were making haste and had promptly to resume our places in the jolting, rickety diligence. Next afternoon came a welcome sight — the snowy cap of Mount Damavand glisten- ing aloft, nearly twenty thousand feet above us, and flashing back a blaze of light from its crystal crown over the green tops of an intervening row of lesser peaks, to tell us we were nearing Kazvin.

Kazvin, with its sixty thousand or more of inhabitants, looked familiar and seemed practically unchanged in appear- ance ; the glazed tiles of the gateway at the entrance of the town shone with the same lustre as before ; the streets were about as dirty, the bazars as busy, and the shops as full as when I first saw them.^ The next time I visited the city I found a regi- ment of Russian soldiers stationed in the garrison, and I won- dered how long their stay might be prolonged.

From Kazvin to the capital is a journey of about ninety-six

miles, or sixteen hours and more if no lengthy stops be made ;

and the road, after leaving the mountains, runs mostly over a

level stretch of elevated country. The number of caravans, as

we observed, became ever greater ; the signs of life ever more

active as we drew nearer to the chief center of Persian life ; and

on the following morning we were passing beneath the high

gates of Teheran, the city now of a Constitution and a National

Assembly.

1 See Jackson, Persia, pp. 403-404.

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