THE KAKHETIAN ROAD—TIFLIS TO SIGNAKH.
A few days after my return from Vladikavkaz, I made preparations for leaving Tiflis. It was near the end of June, and the unbearable heat had driven away nearly all those who were free to go; all the highways leading out of the city were crowded with carts and carriages of every description, carrying household goods and passengers. My friends had contracted with some Molokans (Russian heretics), belonging to the colony of Azamburi, for the removal of their furniture to Signakh; the carriers had promised to come to our house at four o’clock in the morning, but it was nine o’clock before they put in an appearance, and then their carts were half full of other people’s goods, a direct violation of the agreement. If any man ever needed the patience which is proverbially ascribed to the patriarch Job, it is the man who has business dealings with the Muscovite muzhik. You may assail him with all the abuse which your knowledge of his language will permit, you may strike him, you may calmly endeavour to persuade him with the most lucid logic—it is all to no purpose; taking off his cap to scratch his head, he looks at you with an assumption of childlike simplicity, and replies with a proverb more remarkable for its laconism than for its applicability to the matter under discussion. In this case we wrangled for a long time, and then, being unwilling to risk a stroke of apoplexy by getting into a rage, appealed to the majesty of the law, represented by a stalwart policeman, at whose command the carts were emptied forthwith, the contents being deposited on the roadside, and our effects were soon put in their place, and the whole caravan rattled down the hillside about two hours before noon. An hour later a four-horse carriage with springs arrived, and the four of us, my Georgian host, a Russian lady and gentleman, and myself, set out for Kakheti.
After descending through the narrow streets which lie between the Erivan square and the river, we crossed the busy bridge, and mounted the steep bank on the other side, passing through the liveliest part of the Persian quarter. By the time we had got clear of the suburb called the Dogs’ Village, with its camels and caravanserais, we had overtaken the waggons; exchanging friendly salutations with our volunteer baggage-guard, we were soon rolling along the smooth, dusty road in the direction of Orkhevi. On our right, down by the side of the Kura, lay Naftluk, with its beautiful vineyards and orchards, and beyond it the road to Akstafa and Erivan; on the distant southern horizon were the blue mountains of Armenia. On our left hand rose a range of bare-looking hills of no great height.
The region through which the Kakhetian road passes is a flat, waterless, almost uninhabited steppe; the winds which sometimes sweep across it are so violent that it is the custom to seek shelter from them by building the houses in the ground, with the roof on a level with the road. Twenty years ago the “Society for the Re-establishment of Orthodox Christianity in the Caucasus” obtained from the late Tsar a large concession of land near Kara Yazi, and spent 370,000 roubles on the construction of a canal for irrigation (Mariinskii Kanal); the scheme was never completely carried out, and the results obtained have not hitherto been such as to encourage the society, although a few Nestorians, Assyrian Christians, have been induced to settle in this unhealthy land. There are still unmistakable signs of the fact that in ancient times all this steppe was watered from the Kura by an elaborate system of irrigation, which must have made the country very fertile; now the whole tract is an almost unbroken wilderness, where the antelope wanders, unharmed by any hunter.
At Orkhevi there is nothing but the station-house, and those whose only experience of posting has been derived from the military road between Tiflis and Vladikavkaz, are likely to be unpleasantly surprised at the primitive appearance of this traveller’s rest. A bare, dirty room, with two wooden benches and a table, the walls tastefully decorated with official notices, among which the most prominent is one in four languages warning farmers against the phylloxera, thereon portrayed in all the various phases of its development. Such is my remembrance of Orkhevi. The only refreshment obtainable is a samovar (tea-urn) of boiling water, from which you can make your own tea if you have the necessary ingredients with you. A former journey along this road had already made me familiar with all the little discomforts and privations which must be undergone by the visitor to Kakheti, so I was not disappointed. None of the stations are any better all the way to Signakh, and he who does not bring with him his own food for the journey is likely to have a very good appetite by the time he reaches his destination.
AN ARBA
Page 73.
The sun had now reached the meridian, and beat down upon us with terrible force, for our carriage was an open one; we were half-choked with the dust, a thick white layer of which covered us from head to foot; on either side lay bare, brown fields, baked hard as stone, and deeply fissured; no water anywhere; the only thing which broke the monotony of the scene was the occasional passage of a train of arbas, laden with huge, bloated-looking ox-skins, full of wine. The arba is the national vehicle of Georgia, and is said to have been used as a chariot by the ancient kings; it is constructed entirely of wood; there is not so much as a nail or pin of metal in it; the wheels are generally made of one piece of timber, and for this reason the arba is allowed to travel on the highways without paying the tolls which are imposed on carts with tires; a pair of oxen draw the cart, and the creaking of it may be heard afar off. Parched with thirst, and almost stifled with dust, we were glad to reach Vaziani, where we spread our cloaks under an oak-tree by the side of a spring, and proceeded to make a good lunch, after which we slept for a while.
In the afternoon we left Vaziani, and soon passed through the prosperous German colony of Marienfeld, with its neat, homely cottages, shaded by fine poplar-trees. The vicinity of the river Iora makes this a very fertile spot, cool and inviting even in the middle of summer. A little before reaching Marienfeld we saw, on the left, the road to Telav, and the Kakhetian hills now seem to slope down very quickly to meet our road, but we know that we shall have to travel many a weary verst before we reach them. In the evening, at about six o’clock, we arrived at Azamburi, a Russian village not far from the station of Sartachali. It had been agreed that we should spend the night here, so we alighted at the postoyalii dvor, or inn.
Azamburi is exactly like any other Russian village, a long, dirty, double row of wretched hovels. Each farmer has his house and buildings arranged round a square courtyard, in the midst of which lie carts, pigs, agricultural produce, and filth of all kinds. The inhabitants are Molokans; some account of the religious opinions of these people will be found in Mr. D. M. Wallace’s well-known work on Russia; they have no priests nor sacraments, neither smoke nor drink, do not swear, and pay great reverence to the Bible, a copy of which may be seen on a shelf in the living-room of every house. They are not at all attractive, either in physiognomy or conversation; their awful stupidity and ugliness are all the more powerfully felt from the contrast which the native population presents to them. Their choice of a piece of ground for colonization would be inexplicable did we not remember their peculiar religious convictions; they have chosen the very worst place in the whole plain; the only drinking water in the neighbourhood is very bad, so bad that the tea made from it is almost undrinkable, even by people accustomed to Kura water. Quite near the village are stinking, stagnant marshes, which must make the place terribly unhealthy.
After dinner we went outside to smoke, for the Molokan will not suffer the mildest cigarette in his house, and even in the depth of winter the visitor who smokes must burn his weed in the open air. Returning along the road for some little distance, followed by a crowd of children, who, evidently, had never before seen a lady in European dress, we mounted a little hill, whence we saw in the distance our baggage-waggons slowly approaching. In re-entering the village we overtook a farmer with an English reaping-machine; this man was less taciturn than his neighbours, and of his own accord entered into conversation with us; he was loud in his praises of the reaper, and said that the man who invented a certain part of it (a patent screw, I think) ought to be “kissed behind the ear.” We tried to interest him in a pet idea of our own, viz., that village communities should buy machinery collectively, but we regret to say that we could not make a convert of him.
It was nine o’clock before our young friend, Prince Giorgi, arrived with the goods under his charge; and while we were at supper much merriment was caused by his vain endeavours to check himself in the use of the word chort (the devil!), a pet expression of his, but strictly forbidden in the houses of all good Molokans. The night being fine, although the air was cool, we made up our minds to sleep outside rather than risk the onslaughts of the Molokan fleas, and we chose for our bivouac a thrashing-floor about a hundred yards from the house; here we lay down, wrapped in our burkas, and smoked and chatted until we fell asleep. But we were not to have a quiet night; we were roused by the attack of some ferocious dogs; we beat them off several times, but the numbers ever increased, until all the canine population of Azamburi was howling round us.
We were on foot at three o’clock, and, waking up the drivers, got the horses harnessed and started for Kakabeti. In the early morning air flitted beautiful birds with wings as brilliant as those of butterflies, and butterflies as big as birds. It was not so terribly hot as I had found it some weeks before, when I passed through Kakabeti in the afternoon, but it was still close enough to make us long for a breath of the mountain air. This region is swampy, and the fevers make it uninhabitable.
Kakabeti offers nothing of interest. The same wearisome plain stretches all the way to Kajereti, near which is the hospitable abode of one of the Andronikov family. We spent four hours there, and did not leave the station until an hour after noon. Passing the inviting-looking post-road to Bakurtsikhe, on our left, we kept to the plain for a while; then rapidly rising to the village of Nukriani, Signakh came into view at the top of the hill, and the lovely woodlands at our feet seemed all the more beautiful on account of the bare, monotonous character of the parched plain where we had spent the last two days. Descending by a zigzag road, we entered the town, and, passing along the main street, through the market-place, soon reached the very edge of the steep, high hill which rises from the Alazana valley.