soldiers, succeeded immediately: they who were timid took to their heels—the bolder held their tongues. Even the orthodox blacksmith, seeing that the affair was becoming serious, looked round on all sides, and muttered "Nedjelaim?" (What can I do?) tucked up his sleeves, pulled out from his bag the hammer and pincers, and began to shoe the Russian's horse, grumbling between his teeth, "Vala billa beetmi eddeem, (I will not do it, by God!)" It must be remarked that all this took place out of Ammalát's presence. He had hardly looked at the Russians, when, in order to avoid a disagreeable rencontre, he mounted the horse which had just been shod, and galloped off to Bouináki, where his house was situated.
While this was taking place at one end of the exercising ground, a horseman rode up to the front of the reposing soldiers. He was of middling stature, but of athletic frame, and was clothed in a shirt of linked mail, his head protected by a helmet, and in full warlike equipment, and followed by five noúkers. By their dusty dress, and the foam which covered their horses, it might be seen that they had ridden far and fast. The first horseman, fixing his eye on the soldiers, advanced slowly along the piles of muskets, upsetting the two pyramids of fire-arms. The noúkers, following the steps of their master, far from turning aside, coolly rode over the scattered weapons. The sentry, who had challenged them while they were yet at some distance, and warned them not to approach, seized the bit of the steed bestridden by the mail-coated horseman, while the rest of the soldiers, enraged at such an insult from a Mussulman, assailed the party with abuse. "Hold hard! Who are you?" was the challenge and question of the sentinel. "Thou must be a raw recruit if thou knowest not Sultan Akhmet Khan of Avár,"27 coolly answered the man in mail, shaking off the hand of the sentry from his reins. "I think last year I left the Russians a keepsake at Báshli. Translate that for him," he said to one of his noúkers. The Aváretz repeated his words in pretty intelligible Russian.
"'Tis Akhmet Khan! Akhmet Khan!" shouted the soldiers. "Seize him! hold him fast! down with him! pay him for the affair of Báshli28—the villains cut our wounded to pieces."
"Away, brute!" cried Sultan Akhmet Khan to the soldier who had again seized the bridle of his horse—"I am a Russian general."
"A Russian traitor!" roared a multitude of voices; "bring him to the Captain: drag him to Derbend, to Colonel Verkhóffsky."
"'Tis only to hell I would go with such guides!" said Akhmet, with a contemptuous smile, and making his horse rear, he turned him to the right and left; then, with a blow of the nogaik,29 he made him leap into the air, and disappeared. The noúkers kept their eye on the movements of their chief, and uttering their warcry, followed his steps, and overthrowing several of the soldiers, cleared a way for themselves into the road. After galloping off to a distance of scarce a hundred paces, the Khan rode away at a slow walk, with an expression of the greatest sang-froid, not deigning to look back, and coolly playing with his bridle. The crowd of Tartars assembled round the blacksmith attracted his attention. "What are you quarrelling about, friends?" asked Akhmet Khan of the nearest, reining in his horse.
In sign of respect and reverence, they all applied their hands to their foreheads when they saw the Khan. The timid or peaceably disposed among them, dreading the consequences, either from the Russians or the Khan, to which this rencontre might expose them, exhibited much discomfiture at the question; but the idle, the ruffian, and the desperate—for all beheld with hatred the Russian domination—crowded turbulently round him with delight. They hurriedly told him what was the matter.
"And you stand, like buffaloes, stupidly looking on, while they force your brother to work like a brute under the yoke!" exclaimed the Khan, gloomily, to the bystanders; "while they laugh in your face at your customs, and trample your faith under their feet! and ye whine like old women, instead of revenging yourselves like men! Cowards! cowards!"
"What can we do?" cried a multitude of voices together; "the Russians have cannon—they have bayonets!"
"And ye, have ye not guns? have ye not daggers? It is not the Russians that are brave, but ye that are cowards! Shame of Mussulmans! The sword of Daghestán trembles before the Russian whip. Ye are afraid of the roll of the cannon; but ye fear not the reproach of cowardice. The fermán of a Russian prístav30 is holier to you than a chapter of the Koran. Siberia frightens you more than hell. Did your forefathers act, did your forefathers think thus? They counted not their enemies, they calculated not. Outnumbered or not, they met them, bravely fought them, and gloriously died! And what fear ye? Have the Russians ribs of iron? Have their cannon no breach? Is it not by the tail that you seize the scorpion?" This address stirred the crowd. The Tartar vanity was touched to the quick. "What do we care for them? Why do we let them lord it over us here?" was heard around. "Let us liberate the blacksmith from his work—let us liberate him!" they roared, as they narrowed their circle round the Russian soldiers, amidst whom Alékper was shoeing the captain's horse. The confusion increased. Satisfied with the tumult he had created, Sultan Akhmet Khan, not wishing to mix himself up in an insignificant brawl, rode out of the crowd, leaving two noúkers to keep alive the violent spirit among the Tartars, while, accompanied by the remainder, he rode rapidly to the ootakh31 of Ammalát.
"Mayest thou be victorious," said Sultan Akhmet Khan to Ammalát Bek, who received him at the threshold. This ordinary salutation, in the Circassian language, was pronounced with so marked an emphasis, that Ammalát as he kissed him, asked, "Is that a jest or a prophecy, my fair guest?"
"That depends on thee," replied the Sultan. "It is upon the right heir of the Shamkhalát32 that it depends to draw the sword from the scabbard."
"To sheath it no more, Khan? An unenviable destiny. Methinks it is better to reign in Bouináki, than for an empty title to be obliged to hide in the mountains like a jackal."
"To bound from the mountains like a lion, Ammalát; and to repose, after your glorious toils, in the palace of your ancestors."
"To repose? Is it not better not to be awakened at all?
"Would you behold but in a dream what you ought to possess in reality? The Russians are giving you the poppy, and will lull you with tales, while another plucks the golden flowers of the garden."33
"What can I do with my force?"
"Force—that is in thy soul, Ammalát!... Despise dangers and they bend before you.... Dost thou hear that?" added Sultan Akhmet Khan, as the sound of firing reached them from the town. "It is the voice of victory!"
Saphir-Ali rushed into the chamber with an agitated face.
"Bouináki is in revolt," he hurriedly began; "a crowd of rioters has overpowered the detachment, and they have begun to fire from the rocks."34
"Rascals!" cried Ammalát, as he threw his gun over his shoulder. "How dared they to rise without me! Run, Saphir-Ali, threaten them with my name; kill the first who disobeys."
"I have done all I could to restrain them," said Saphir-Ali, "but none would listen to me, for the noúkers of Sultan Akhmet Khan were urging them on, saying that he had ordered them to slay the Russians."
"Indeed! did my noúkers say that?" asked the Khan.
"They did not say so much, but they set the example," said Saphir-Ali.
"In that case they
The brother of Hassan Khan Djemontái, who became Khan of Avár by marrying the Khan's widow and heiress.
The Russian detachment, consisting on this occasion of 3000 men, was surrounded by 60,000. These were, Ouizmi Karakaidákhsky, the Aváretzes, Akoushínetzes, the Boulinétzes of the Koi-Soú, and others. The Russians fought their way out by night, but with considerable loss.
The whip of a Kazak.
A superintendent.
The house, in Tartar, is "ev;" "outakh," mansion; and "sarái," edifice in general; "haram-khanéh," the women's apartments. For palace they employ the word "igarát." The Russians confound all these meanings in the word "sákla," which, in the Circassian language, is house.
The father of Ammalát was the eldest of the family, and consequently the true heir to the Shamkhalát. But the Russians, having conquered Daghestán, not trusting to the good intentions of this chief, gave the power to the younger brother.
A
The Tartars, like the North American Indians, always, if possible, shelter themselves behind rocks and enclosures, &c., when engaged in battle.
