Explore "The Cruise of the Gyro Car" by Herbert Strang on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
PASSING a long stretch of walled olive-gardens, the travellers arrived at Elbasan. The gate in its high and massive wall stood open. They ran through into a narrow, dirty street, roofed over with matting and dry leaves, scattering the groups of wild, sullen-looking inhabitants, some of whom raised a fierce cry of "Shaitan! "; others put their fingers into their mouths and whistled shrilly, after the manner of English butcher-boys. But the travellers were not molested; they left the town, spun through a barren valley, and crossing the river Skumbi by the high one-arched bridge, found themselves climbing a steep and difficult path that wound along at the edge of clay precipices, so narrow that if they had met another vehicle, or a mule-train, further progress would have been impossible.
They had nearly reached the top, going slowly as the perilous nature of the path demanded, when they saw, bright against the grey wall ahead, a young man with a rifle in his hand, intently watching them.