As I rode with Mustapha up a long, winding pass on the outskirts of the range he pointed at the valley below us. "The Turkish Railway," he said solemnly.
A long line of laden camels wound slowly up the opposite side; for a full quarter of a mile they covered in single file the road winding up out of the valley. I pulled my horse up, and Mustapha stopped his alongside of mine. We both bent our heads forward and listened. The sound of their tinkling bells came faintly across the valley to us; the low, musical tones, the quiet, measured movement, all was in keeping with the towering mountains and the still, clear air. Hassan rode up with the other men and joined us. He put his hands up to his mouth and gave a shrill, prolonged whistle in exact imitation of the engine we had left at Konia. The men looked at one another and laughed. Then they shrugged their shoulders and pushed on up the path.
The Taurus range bounds in a semicircle the base of the plateau we had crossed. We had always been over 3,000 feet above sea-level, and now the heights of the Boulghar Dagh, as this part of the Taurus is called, rose high above us. The pass we were making for measured nearly 6,000 feet, and it looked low in the level of the range. After leaving Eregli we had made a short day to Tchaym, some four hours' ride across a very barren stretch of country, with the snow mountains always in front of us. The next day was to be our last on the plains, for our destination was Ulu Kishla, well up on the hills. We had always great difficulty in deciding what the stages of our journey were to be. Maps and guidebooks were out of the question, the Zaptiehs had only very vague ideas as to distances, and local informants were hard to understand.
Our destinations and the distances formed fruitful topics of conversation with the men, and generally ended in amicable wrangles.
X having made out from the khanji[3] that it was ten hours' ride from Tchaym to Ulu Kishla, asked Rejeb's opinion on the matter.
MUSTAPHA. No, no, twelve hours. Tchaym to Ulu Kishla twelve hours.
REJEB AND MUSTAPHA (_in chorus_). No, no, the Pasha Effendi goes like the post.
X. It is ten hours; Rejeb and Mustapha go like camels. (_Roars of laughter._)