Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/242

126 in 1880, accomplished the distance without difficulty on horse- back in a single day; Curzon did the same in 1881, but in the reverse direction; and on my third transit over the route I met at Khatunabad a Persian horseman who that very day had ridden the still longer distance from Kishlak to Khatunabad, had rested for five hours near the Sar-Darrah, or Caspian Gates, and was ready to pursue his journey farther. All this I mention in behalf of the vicinity of Aivan-i-Kaif as Alexander's first halting-place, emphasizing the fact that he was advancing, as Arrian says, only with light cavalry and the Macedonian phalanx that had withstood the test of the forced march from Ecbatana to Rhagae, so that the distance from the latter place to the Caspian Gates was only 'one day's journey for one marching as Alexander did'— Truly ours had been Alexander's pace.

Aivan-i Kaif has a most euphonious name, for in Persian Aivān signifies ' Recreation Pavilion,' or ' Palace of Pleasure'; and local tradition, as already remarked, commonly considers the designation of the place to be Aivan-i Kai, 'Pavilion of the Kaianan Kings'; but the wretched condition of the entire town seemed to belie this high-sounding title, and almost