best arrangement they could
with the Russians. In the course of his survey of the frontier, which
he said he examined almost foot by foot, Gordon came to Mount Ararat,
which he very nearly ascended, as he tells the reader in the following
graphic narrative:--

"When we arrived at the foot of Mount Ararat we were unable to
proceed along the frontier any further because the ground becomes
extremely broken by the innumerable streams of lava which have
run down from it. The ground is black with cinders. They look as
if quite recently emitted, and no one would imagine from their
appearance that Ararat had been extinct so long. Our road went
along the northern or Russian slope of Ararat, and passed
through a very old city called Kourgai, where there are still the
remains of a church and part of an old castle. Even the Armenians
do not pretend to know its history, but some of them say that
Noah lived there. It is situated half-way up the mountain, and
there is no living person within twelve miles of it. There used
to be a populous village named Aralik, with 5000 inhabitants, a
little above it, but in 1840 an earthquake shook Mount Ararat,
and in four minutes an immense avalanche had buried this place so
completely as to leave scarcely any vestige of its site. Not a
single person escaped, which is not to be wondered at,
considering the mass that fell. Stones of twenty or thirty tons
were carried as far as fifteen to twenty miles into the plain. It
has left a tremendous cleft in Ararat itself. Other villages were
destroyed at the same time, but none so completely as this. The
village immediately below Aralik was also destroyed, but the
graveyard remained untouched, and the tombstones stand up intact
in the midst of the ruins. The common people say that it was
saved on account of a saint who was buried there. All these
places have a very lonely look. Both the Kurds and the Armenians,
if they can possibly help it, never pass near Mount Ararat, while
they think it a great sin to ascend it.

"I must now tell you of my ascent, or rather my near ascent, of
Great Ararat.

"I and my interpreter and three sappers went up to a Kurdish
encampment where an old Kurd lived who assisted five of our
countrymen to ascend about two years ago. The only assistance,
however, th