the senselo which we have been accustomed in speaking of
the route between England and India. It is much more literally employed. - Starting from Quetta, in Baluchistan, Mrs. Beau, after a sojourn in Mean, made her way to Krasnovodsk, on the Eastern shore .of the Caspian. She crossed the Caspian to Fetrovsleand journeyed from this place to Batoum, on the Eastern extremity of the Black Sea. Along the Southern shore of the Black Sea her three methods .of progression, side-saddle, camel, and railway, had to be given up for conveyance by sea. But of this part of her travel she takes small account. It will suffice to say -that .she went home by constantinople, Sofia, Belgrade, Budapest-Nieman, and Dresden. Indeed, from Tiflis to Batoum occupies but twenty-five pages tett . of three hundred and fifteen. An appendix gives. some details of Major Benn's ride from Seistan to Meshed tad' the Peiso-Afghan frontier. This, a distance of five hundred and "twenty -miles, was done upon a pony. Major Bonn left Seistan' on April. 18th, and accomplished his journey, not without much hardahip and difficulty, by the end of the month. This brief accomit of the contents of Mrs. Bean's volume might well serve by itself as a sufficient recommenda- tion. Even in.-these days, When many "run to and fro," this kind of journeying is not common. But the reader will find the details of travel JierY entertaining., They were not always entertaining at.the time. --Mrs. Bonn, for instance, found some of the days at -Relates the longest she ever Apent in her life. Things were not bettered by the fact that-she and her-husband were under orders to "make friends with the Persians,"—a singularly hopeless business; one Would judge from her description of the people. Even golf was net to be played, because the Seistanis thought that the red flags in the holes had something to do with a survey, end that a survey meant the annexation of their beautiful Country. Seistan naturally occupies a considerable part of the volume (nearly a half), because the author made a long sojourn in the place. Tho next place of importance after Seistan was .Birjaud. Here we have some interesting descriptions of local society. Among them is the melancholy story of the first wife of the Arnie. She is practically deposed, living by herself, and never visited by her 'husband. Admirers of Islam must find some difficulty in getting over such facts. In former days she had been powerful, and she was the-mother of the Amir's heir, but for no fault of her own, except, it may be, old age, she was practically banished. The book is full of noteworthy things.
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