than any seen in Persia, are harvesting
grain. The carts they use are most peculiar vehicles, with wheels eight
or ten feet in diameter. The tremendous size of the wheels is understood
to materially lighten their draught. After a dozen miles the country
develops into barren wastes, as dreary and verdureless as the deserts of
Seistan. At intervals of a mile the train whirls past a solitary stone
hut occupied by the family of the watchman or section-hand. Sometimes a
man stands out and waves a little flag, and sometimes a woman. Whether
male or female, the flag-signaller is invariably an uncouth bundle of
rags. The telegraph-poles consist of lengths of worn-out rail, with an
upper section of wood on which to fasten the insulators. These make
substantial poles enough, but have a make-shift look, and convey the
impression of financial weakness to the road. The stations are often
quite handsome structures of mingled stone and brickwork. The names are
conspicuously exposed in Russian and Persian and Circassian. Beer, wine,
and eatables are exposed for sale at a lunch-counter, and pedlers vend
boiled lobsters, fish, and fruit about the platforms. On the platform of
every station hangs a bell with a string attached to the tongue. When
almost ready for the train to start, an individual, invested with the
dignity of a military cap with a red stripe, jerks this string slowly and
solemnly thrice. Half a minute later another man in a full military
uniform blows a shrill whistle; yet a third warning, in the shape of a
smart toot from the engine itself, and the train pulls out. Full half the
crowd about the stations appear to be in military uniform; the remainder
are a heterogeneous company, embracing the modern Russian dandy, who
affects the latest Parisian fashions, the Circassians and Georgians in
picturesque attire, and the ever-present ragamuffin moujik. At one
station we pass an institution peculiarly Russian--a railway
prison-car conveying convicts eastward. It resembles an ordinary box-car,
with iron grating toward the top. We can see the poor wretches peeping
through the bars, and the handcuffs on their wrists. Outside at either
end is a narrow platform, where stands, with loaded guns and fixed
bayonets, a guard of four soldiers.

Once or twice before dark the train stops to replenish the engine's
supply of fuel. Elevated iron tanks containing a supply of the liquid
fuel take the place of the coal-sheds familiar to ourselves.