1876 British Viscount & Ambassador James Bryce - Noah's Ark Search

172 THE EXPLORERS OF ARARAT
my friend valiantly on the top of the ridge, I a yard or two below him on the eastern side, the Cossacks and Kurds all
round where they severally pleased, and we courted sleep. Although rather tired, we found the position too novel, and
lay half conscious in a drowsy reverie; dropping off at last to wake with a start at midnight, when the moon’s pale horn
was just showing over the Median mountains. How we got safe down was a marvel to us at the time. There was no
track, but the Kurds seemed to have an idea where they were going. Many were the halts which the Cossacks made,
stretching themselves on the grass to laugh and talk; nor was it now worthwhile to hurry them. At length the morning
star rose in unearthly brightness, and not long after we came to a sweet little grassy plain, where two or three Kurds,
whose flocks were pasturing hard by, had lit a fire of withered bushes, to which our Kurds led us up in a friendly way,
bidding us (as we guessed) warm ourselves. The Cossacks had nearly all gone on out of sight, and we were (as it
afterwards struck us) entirely at the mercy of these wild, swarthy fellows, on whose glittering daggers and matchlocks
the firelight played. However, they had no thought of mischief; perhaps, if it had occurred to them, the sense of
hospitality, which is proverbially strong in the East, would have restrained them from harming those with whom they
had eaten. Then between four and five o’clock another glorious dawn began; and just before sunrise we reached the
tent at Sardarbulakh, much to the relief of Jaafar’s mind, and flung ourselves down on the tent floor to sleep the sleep
of the weary.
Roused again at eight or nine o’clock—both the watches had stopped, so we could only guess at the time of
day—we ought clearly to have gone up Little Ararat, and obtained from his top a fuller notion of his great brother’s
structure. Provisions, however, ran short, and the Cossacks were anxious to return to Aralykh, taking back with them
their comrades whom we had found in the two tents, as the post was to be withdrawn for the season. Accordingly the
tents were struck, everything packed on the baggage horses, the Kurds paid for their day’s and night’s service on the
hill. Then, before starting, the Cossacks gathered in a ring in front of the spot where the tents had stood, and began
singing Russian songs. The words we, of course, could not follow—I believe they were mostly camp songs, some
commemorating military exploits, some farewells to departing comrades—but the airs, usually lively, but occasionally
tender and plaintive, dwelt long in our memory. One stood in the middle and led, firing off a gun at intervals, the others
sometimes singing with him, sometimes merely joining in the refrain or chorus. The voices were good, and the time
perfect.
Before noon we bid a regretful farewell to Sardarbulakh, and rode down into the plain, this time taking a track
outside of the buttress of Takjultu, instead of behind it, and thence across the arid slopes to Aralykh, which we reached
about four o’clock without further incident, though once during the way an alarm was given that there were strange
people about. Owing, I suppose, to the bracing quality of the keen dry air, we were much less fatigued than we had
expected to be. Colonel Shipshef welcomed us with characteristic heartiness, and we spent a pleasant evening with
him, lamenting more than ever that unhappy event at the tower of Babel, which made our communications so limited.
Next morning we mounted the tarantass once more, and drove off across the Araxes and through the dusty villages
back into the furnace of Erivan.
Two days later I found myself at the Armenian monastery of Etchmiadzin, near the northern foot of Ararat, and
was presented to the archimandrite who rules that illustrious house. It came out in conversation that we had been on
the mountain, and the Armenian gentleman who was acting as interpreter turned to the archimandrite and said: “This
Englishman says he has ascended to the top of Massis” (Ararat). The venerable man smiled sweetly. “No,” he replied,
“that cannot be. No one has ever been there. It is impossible.”
Chapter VIII
After returning to Erivan from Ararat, we made a hurried expedition to the famous monastery of Etchmiadzin,
which claims to be the oldest monastic foundation in the world, and has for many centuries been the seat of the
Armenian Patriarch or Katholikos, the spiritual head of all true Armenians, in whatsoever empire, Russian, Turkish,
Persian, Austrian, or British, they may dwell. It is distant about thirteen miles, some two hours driving, from Erivan, and
the journey gave us our first experience of that wonderful vehicle the Russian telega—a cart, or shallow lidless box,
about six feet long by four wide, set upon wheels with no pretence of springs or anything in the nature of springs. A
little hay was thrown in, among which we were told to squat. We put in a traveling bag, but soon found it impossible to
sit upon that, or on the sides of the box itself, for the jolting knocked one about like a pea on a hot iron. As soon as the
pace was quickened they become so violent that we could only hold ourselves in the cart by grasping its sides, and a
whisky flask which had been safely lodged in my companion’s breast coat-pocket was shot out like a cannon ball, and
flung to a distance in the road, where of course it broke into a hundred pieces. How people manage to travel for many
continuous days in such vehicles without grievous bodily harm, it is hard to understand, but the thing is done.
There was something inexpressibly solemn in the great desolate plain that lay around us under the dying light—a
plain in which Armenian tradition places the site of the Garden of Eden. The curse of the flaming sword might well be
thought to have clung to it, for few spots on earth have seen more ruin and slaughter than this Araxes valley. It has
been the highway through which the Eastern conquerors and marauders, from the days of the Sassanid kings Shapur