acrossasiaminoro00chiluoft

128 ACROSS ASIA MINOR ON FOOT
any—lay unperformed in that sunlit open space over
which 1 looked, where a few grazing camels were the
only living things visible. And when, after ha\ ing
passed round the bend, a stone flung by one unseen
fell near me, 1 took it as a mocking tribute to
cautiousness nor out of place.
Before descending from the saddle of Kurt Dagh
the road went across great heaving downs. They
were little lower than the ridge itself, and from
them, as afternoon drew on, I looked down into
the Artik Ova, a highland plain twelve or fifteen
miles across. In the south and east it was bounded
by the fine broken range which has Yildiz Dagh, of
nearly 9000 feet, for its highest peak. A little later
the enchanting violet glow I had first seen when
leaving Turkhal settled gradually over the country,
and in half an hour the whole landscape was a
study in monochrome. Yet the colour was entirely
transparent, and had no obscurity of haze except
where the smoke of several villages, and a line
of dust from the busy road below, ascended vertically
in the still air. The plain itself lay as a
wash of deepest purple, the darkest portion of the
view. On the range of Yildiz Dagh sunlight still
lingered, but even so assumed the universal colour,
though flushing now to pink along the summits. That
range, indeed, standing in pellucid air, with side-long
lij^^ht throwing into strong relief each ravine and
spur and rock and dimple, and shading them with
every imaginable graduation of violet and purple,
became the glamorous mountains of a promised
land to be reached the next day. And over all
was a dome of sky unflecked by cloud ; it passed
from gold to green above the sunset, and thence to
a cool deep grey in the east, where stars were
showing already. Such are the evenings you get
sometimes on the plateau of Asia Minor after long
summer and autumn heat has baked the land.
And the sounds that reached me as I descended
towards the plain suited well this evening of elusive