It was a glorious walk over the waste from Kabardinka to Ghilendzhik,
with all manner of beauty and interest along the way. I left the road
and cut across country, following the telegraph poles. In front of me
fat blue lizards scuttled away, looking like little lilac-coloured
_dachshunds_; silent brown snakes shot out of reach at the sight of my
shadow; and every now and then, poking and grubbing like a hedgehog,
behold a large tortoise out for prey like his brother reptiles. This
domiciled the tortoise for me; otherwise I had only associated him
with suburban gardens and the "Zoo." Now as he hissed at me angrily I
knew him to be a lizard with a shell on his back. I picked up several
of them and examined their faces--they didn't like that at all. They
have a peculiar clerical appearance, something of the sternness and
fixity of purpose which seems to express itself in the jaws and eyes
of some learned divines.
With what eagerness the tortoises scrambled away when I disturbed
them. They run almost speedily in their natural state. I was amused at
the strength of their claws, and the rate at which they tore a passage
into a thicket and disappeared.
Half-way to Ghilendzhik there is a stone quarry, and there one may see
thousands of what are called in England "Cape gooseberries," bright
berries of the size and colour of big ripe strawberries.
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