National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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Overland to India : vol.1 |
2 OVERLAND TO INDIA
CHAP.
We tarried a while in the roadstead of Sukhum-Kale ;
a couple of boats rowed by sinewy Abkhazians took off a
little cargo ; a boatman came on board and talked with
a young woman on the middle deck ; she burst into con-
tinuous weeping, and all efforts to console her were vain.
Her husband had been shot in a riot. She was one of
thousands and thousands of Russian women who wept in
those days. Her wailing sounded desperate and hopeless
above the raging of the storm till the end of the voyage.
Beyond Poti the violence of the storm increased, the
sky was blue-black, and the rain pelted on the deck and
the saloon windows, but we had only three hours more.
At midnight the vessel entered the harbour of Batum.
What a dismal landing ! Pouring rain, pitchy darkness
unbroken by lights, dead silence, no porters, no droskies,
and, worst of all, the news that railway traffic had been
stopped three days before. In fact, a great strike was in
progress, involving all departments of labour and trade.
However, under cover of the darkness, a couple of bold
dock-labourers ventured, in consideration of high pay, to
take charge of our luggage and guide us to the nearest
hotel, a regular den of thieves, full of rogues and vaga-
bonds. If they were detected as strike-breakers, they
would be mercilessly shot down, our porters assured us,
and we subsequently found that their statement was not
exaggerated.
I was on the way to Teheran. But I might well be
asked why on earth I chose just now the route through
the Caucasus, the most restless corner of the Russian
Empire. Well, when I left Constantinople on October
25, furnished with two special passports from the Russian
Ambassador Zinovieff, formerly Minister in Stockholm,
comparative quiet prevailed in Russia, and at least the
railways were being worked. My goal was Tibet, and I
had decided to travel overland to India. I had a choice of
three routes to the capital of Persia : (1) Batum—Tiflis-
Baku—Resht—Teheran ; (2) Batum —Tiflis— E rivan — N aki-
chevan — Tabriz — Teheran ; (3) Trebizond — Erzerum —
Bayazid—Khoi—Tabriz, and Teheran. I knew the first of
old, and therefore wished to avoid it. The road from
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