acrossasiaminoro00chiluoft

384 ACROSS ASIA MINOR ON FOOT
now was placing branches above to keep wild animals
away. The body, he said, was that of one who had
been found dead upon the road. With the English
instinct for a " crowner's quest " strong within me, I
wished to learn more ; it seemed a strange thing to
bury a man by the roadside. Did the za2')tiehs at the
guard-house know of it ? I asked. Yes. Was the
dead man a Moslem ? Yes. Why was the grave
here ? This somewhat needless inquiry was answered
with the question, Where should it be ? to which I
had no answer.
On gaining the second ridge I looked down into
the long plain which stretches from the mountains
behind Marash in the north to Antioch in the south.
It was green as a meadow, its winding rivers were
gleaming, and a marshy lake, which seemed to
spread completely across the plain, gave the idea of
miry ways to be passed on the road to Marash. By
a narrow tortuous path, covering three feet for every
one of direct progress, we came down to level country
as night approached. Here grew wild flowers in
the rankest profusion — young hollyhocks, anemones,
peonies growing like thistles, and asphodel in area like
fields of wheat ; within a hundred yards I could have
gathered a score of flowers familiar in English gardens.
Although we reached the plain by dusk. El Oghlu
proved to be still some distance ofl", and again night
caught us on the road. Travelling in the dark I
always tried to avoid, yet as often as not a stage
was not completed by daylight. Ighsan had hated
being benighted, and Mustapha now in his turn
began to fume and grow surly with the falling darkness,
and to complain of late starting. In Asia Minor
one may be shot on the road after dark, especially in
towns, if not carrying a lantern. There was more
than this, however, in Mustapha's dislike. I never
fully understood his objections, but suspected that
fear of the supernatural had something to do with
them.
At last El Oghlu loomed out of the darkness as