gradually led up to a great forest of pines, succeeded higher up by cedars and junipers. The ground in some places was a perfect garden of spring flowers. Two or three species of Crocus, Cyclamen vernum , Scillas, Chionodoxas, two species of Colchicum, and quantities of Anemone blanda covered the ground; and I have no doubt that anyone staying long enough in this range of mountains in summer, when the snow has melted on the higher summits, which rise to something like 10,000 feet, would gather a rich booty in plants, birds and butterflies. But though it is now over forty years since I visited Lycia, I have never heard of anyone going there on purpose to collect.
After crossing a pass at about 5,000 feet elevation, the road descended along the side of a very steep gorge to some farms inhabited in summer by the people of Alioory, but then quite deserted. Farther on I reached a place where some Albanian Greeks had started a sawmill and were cutting the pines into boards for export. There we stayed for the night and slept in a wooden hut with some wild-looking Greek woodmen. There was a slight hoar frost on the ground in the morning. Going into the forest I found for the first time the fine large snowdrop which now bears my name, and which has since been exported in large quantities from the mountains near Smyrna and has become common in English gardens. I saw tracks of wild pigs and also of bear, but could find none among the men who had any idea of hunting; their one object seemed to be to cut and burn the forest, which is no doubt by this time largely destroyed. For eight miles beyond the mill the road led through the same pine forest, in which were four or five sawmills, and then crossed the wide bed of a mountain torrent which had at some time been dammed by landslips. Tits, woodpeckers, nuthatches, and finches, including the Serin finch, were the common birds of this forest, but on a march of this sort, when one cannot stop long to go off the road, one cannot do more than sample the birds and plants. The only way to collect properly would be to bring a tent and provisions so as to be independent of the dirty villages and their inhabitants. But it must be remembered that this trip was only undertaken as a reconnaissance, when the voyage to Cyprus was prevented.
From Arsa I descended to the valley of Xanthus, where the river was unfordable owing to melting snow, and I had to go two hours upstream to reach a bridge. After this the road lay through a fine plain with large scattered pine trees, more like a park than anything I have seen in Turkey, only the grass is wanting and the sun very hot. In the evening I reached Macri and found the steamer had left for Smyrna the day before. So I arranged with a man to provide horses at eighty piastres each to go to Mughla, and the same zaptieh, Ibrahim, whom I liked very much, was to accompany me. A bear was reported by the hunters who went with me before, but they were not at all inclined to go after him, and the men who knew the place could not be found, so, knowing the wandering habits of bears, I thought it only a waste of time to go after him alone. I sent on the horses to a place six hours on the road to Mughla, and crossed the gulf in a boat to a little port called Godjik, where I found
a very bad lodging. The road from here was oyer a very different and
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