CHAPTER VI

THE CENTAUR—THE MONGOLS AND CALMUCKS—A RUSSIAN TABOON.

THE origin of the fabulous Centaur is referred by some of the learned to the Steppes, whence the first horses, and probably their riders also, passed into Thessaly. The equestrian skill acquired by the Thessalians at an early period when the horse was unknown in the rest of Greece, might have induced the imaginative beholders to declare in hyperbolical language that the horse and rider were one body:—

“These gallants Had witchcraft in ’t; they grew into their seat, And to such wondrous doing brought their horse As they had been incorpsed, and deminatured With the brave beast.”

And thus what was at first but a figurative expression, may have come afterwards to be regarded as standing for a literal truth. Or, as it is still more likely, the appearance of the first mounted strangers may have so terrified the native inhabitants, as to have sent them flying, with an awful story in their mouths of the invasion of the country by a set of monsters, half man, half quadruped. Thus it was in South America, where the natives for a long while believed that the cavalry of the invaders were composite animals, which they called Gachupins, a word which continued to be applied as a nickname to the Spaniards, until they were expelled from the continent. The Mongol Tartar of the Steppes is just such a being as an artist would choose to form the human portion of the more than half brutish figure of the Centaur. The upper portion of his frame is well developed, but his weak and ill-formed legs seem made only to hold him on his horse, on whose back he passes most of his life, and with which he appears to form as it were one whole. The Tartar’s head, round as a bullet, looks like a weight stuck on his body to balance it in the gallop. No other expression than those of animal impulses is discernible in his hard features, and small, black, oblique eyes. He scarcely exhibits a trace of those spiritual conceptions which are to be found among all other races, however rude; he possesses not the least element of a mythology, or of a primitive religion. The ancients, who make mention of this people, say that they worshipped the sword as the emblem of physical force; and, according to the traditions and songs of the Sclavonic nations, the Tartar has a new deity for every day of his life, a saying which very significantly expresses a devotion that regards only the enjoyments of each passing day. Blind obedience to their leaders is instinctive in this race; and military discipline, which among others is the elaborate work of art, is with them the spontaneous impulse of nature. Their leaders, who have obtained such hideous renown, combined in their own persons till the good and bad qualities of their hordes; they were born to command armies, and possessed the art of strategy in the highest degree, and were utterly incapable of mercy. The deeds of Attila, the scourge of God, are well known. Genghis Khan, sitting in his tent beneath the pole-star, issued his orders to two armies, one of which was devastating India, the other Germany. Nay, the inferior leaders often apprehended and fell in with the general plan of operations without receiving any special instructions; the whole host, the whole race, was evermore conducted by the unfailing instinct that guides the vulture to its prey. Genghis Khan could not read, he did not even know the history of his own race, and yet he and the other Mongol conquerors were not barbarians, if the art of creating wealth and power constitutes civilization. The Mongols were sedulous to advance trade and manufactures. When they sacked a city, they generally exempted the artisans from the general butchery, and transported them to their own dominions. The system of posting was known to them; Genghis Khan’s courier-stations extended from China to Poland. It was his wish to establish everywhere one uniform system of weights and measures, and it is said that he even hit upon the invention of bank-notes.

Were we now to ask, what was the purpose of all the Mongol expeditions to the remotest regions, it would not be easy to answer the question. Their leaders did not set the least value on the wealth they seemed to hunt after. Destruction was their only apparent object. It was once coolly discussed by them in a council of war, whether it would not be better to extirpate the whole population of Persia, and turn the entire face of the country into pasture ground; and the plan was very near being realized. The Mongol rulers always declared that it was their vocation to chastise and exterminate mankind, a belief which is not yet extinct in the race of Genghis Khan. The Mongols possess not one poet, not one artist, nevertheless they can claim one architectural invention as peculiarly their own, that, namely, of building up towers of living men cemented together with mortar. Timur Lenk, or Tamurlane, used to assist the masons with his own hand at this work. What is the greatest bliss in this world? This question having been once propounded among the sages and chief men, the Khan replied: “It is to vanquish the foe, to outrage his wife before his eyes, to slaughter his children, and then to torture himself to death.” The sovereign’s opinion exactly coincided with that of the people.

Such is the character of the race that first perhaps deserved the name of “tamers of horses.”

The Calmucks, a principal branch of the great Mongol stock, are more widely dispersed over the globe than any other, even the Arabs not excepted. Tribes of this people occur over all the countries of Upper Asia, between 38° and 52° north latitude, and from the most northern bend of the Hoang-ho to the banks of the Volga. They are the _Hippophagi_, or eaters of horseflesh, of Pliny, and the more ancient historians. They have very large settlements in the neighbourhood of Taganrok, and there Dr. Clarke had an opportunity of studying their habits and appearance. Calmuck men and women were continually galloping their horses through the streets of the town, or lounging in the public places. The women, he says, ride better than the men, and a male Calmuck on horseback looks as if he was intoxicated, and likely to fall off every instant though he never loses his seat; but the women sit with much ease, and ride with extraordinary skill. We shall see however by and by, that the men are better equestrians than the learned traveller supposed. The ceremony of marriage among the Calmucks is performed on horseback. A girl is first mounted and rides off at full speed. Her lover pursues, and if he overtakes her she becomes his wife on the spot, and then returns with him to his tent. But it sometimes happens that the woman does not wish to marry the person by whom she is pursued, in which case she will not suffer him to overtake her; and Dr. Clarke was assured that no instance occurs of a Calmuck girl being thus caught unless she has a partiality for her pursuer. If she dislikes him she rides, in English sporting phrase, _neck or nothing_, until she has completely escaped, or until the pursuer’s horse is tired out, leaving her at liberty to return, to be afterwards chased by some more favoured admirer.

Of all the inhabitants of the Russian empire, the Calmucks are the most distinguished by peculiarity of feature and manners. In their personal appearance they are athletic, and very forbidding. Their hair is coarse and black, their language harsh and guttural. The Cossacks alone esteem them, and intermarry with them; and these unions sometimes produce women of very great beauty, although nothing is more hideous than a Calmuck. High, prominent, broad cheek bones, widely separated from each other; a flat and broad nose; coarse, greasy, jet black hair; scarcely any eyebrows; and enormous prominent ears, constitute no very inviting portrait. Their persons are indescribably filthy, and their habits loathsome. They eat raw horseflesh, and may be seen tearing it like wild beasts from large bones which they hold in their hands. Sometimes they cook their meat, but not in a manner that would make it much more inviting to an English stomach. They cut the muscular parts into steaks which they place under their saddles, and after they have galloped thirty or forty miles, they find the meat tender and palatable. This is a common practice with them on their journeys. The author of Hudibras alludes to this culinary process in terms more pointed than decorous.

Every body has heard of the fermented liquor called _koumiss_, which the Calmucks, the Tartars, &c., manufacture from the milk of the mare. It is produced by combining with six of warm milk, one part of warm water, and a little very sour milk or old koumiss. The vessel is then covered with a thick cloth and left in a moderately warm place for twenty-four hours, until the whole mass becomes sour. After this it is twice beaten with a stick in the shape of a churn staff, so as perfectly to mix together the thick parts and the thin. This being done the process is complete, and the liquor is ready for drinking.

A subsequent process of distillation obtains from this koumiss an ardent spirit called _rack_ or _racky_, a name identical with that given to the spirit manufactured in the East Indies. Dr. Clarke found some women in the act of making it. “The still,” he says, “was composed of mud, or very close clay. For the neck of the retort a cane was used; and the receiver was entirely covered by a coating of wet clay. The brandy had just passed over. The woman who had the management of the distillery, wishing to give us a small taste of the spirit, thrust a stick with a small tuft of camel’s hair into the receiver, dropped a portion of it on the retort, and waving the instrument above her head, scattered the remaining liquor in the air. I asked the meaning of this ceremony, and was told it was a religious custom to give always the first of the brandy which they drew from the receiver to their god. The stick was then plunged into the liquor a second time, when more brandy adhering to the camel’s hair, she squeezed it into the palm of her dirty hand, and having tasted the liquor, presented it to our lips.”

A recent traveller, Madame de Hell, gives a more pleasing picture of the Calmucks, whom she saw under favourable circumstances, being the guest of one of their princes. The following is her account of an equestrian entertainment she witnessed:—

“The moment we were perceived, five or six mounted men, armed with long lassos (strong flexible thongs with running nooses) rushed into the middle of the taboon (herd of half wild horses), keeping their eyes constantly fixed on the young prince, who was to point out the animal they should seize. The signal being given, they instantly galloped forward and noosed a young horse with a long dishevelled mane, whose dilated eyes and smoking nostrils betokened inexpressible terror. A lightly-clad Calmuck, who followed them on foot, immediately sprang upon the stallion, cut the thongs that were throttling him, and engaged with him in an incredible contest of daring and agility. It would be impossible, I think, for any spectacle more vividly to affect the mind than that which now met our eyes. Sometimes the rider and his horse rolled together on the grass; sometimes they shot through the air with the speed of an arrow, and then stopped abruptly, as if a wall had all at once risen up before them. On a sudden the furious animal would crawl on its belly, or rear in a manner that made us shriek with terror, then plunging forward again in his mad gallop, he would dash through the taboon, and endeavour in every possible way to shake off his novel burden.

“But this exercise, violent and dangerous as it appeared to us, seemed but sport to the Calmuck, whose body followed all the movements of the animal with so much suppleness, that one would have fancied that the same spirit animated both bodies. The sweat poured in foaming streams from the stallion’s flanks, and he trembled in every limb. As for the rider, his coolness would have put to shame the most accomplished horseman in Europe. In the most critical moments he still found himself at liberty to wave his arms in token of triumph; and in spite of the indomitable humour of his steed, he had sufficient command over it to keep it almost always within the circle of our vision. At a signal from the prince, two horsemen, who had kept as close as possible to the daring centaur, seized him with amazing quickness, and gallopped away with him, before we had time to comprehend this new manœuvre. The horse, for a moment stupified, soon made off at full speed, and was lost in the midst of the herd. These performances were repeated several times without a single rider suffering himself to be thrown.

“But what was our amazement when we saw a boy of ten years come forward to undertake the same exploit! They selected for him a young white stallion of great size, whose fiery bounds and desperate efforts to break his bonds, indicated a most violent temper.

“I will not attempt to depict our intense emotions during this new conflict. This child, who, like the other riders, had only the horse’s mane to cling to, afforded an example of the power of reasoning over instinct and brute force. For some minutes he maintained his difficult position with heroic intrepidity. At last, to our great relief, a horseman rode up to him, caught him up in his outstretched arm, and threw him on the croup behind him.”

We will now lay before our readers the economy of a Russian taboon, as described by Kohl, the German traveller. A small number of stallions and mares, placed under the care of a herdsman, are sent into the Steppe as the nucleus of the herd. The foals are kept, and the herd is allowed to go on increasing, until the number of horses is thought to be about as large as the estate can conveniently maintain. A taboon seldom consists of more than a thousand horses; but there are landowners in the Steppe, who are supposed to possess eight or ten such taboons in different parts of the country. It is only when the taboon is said to be full, that the owner begins to derive revenue from it, partly by using the young horses on the estate itself, and partly by selling them at the fairs, or to the travelling horse-dealers in the employ of the government contractors.

The tabunshick, to whose care the taboon is intrusted, must be a man of indefatigable activity, and of an iron constitution; proof alike against the severest cold, and the most burning heat, and capable of living in a constant exposure to every kind of weather, without the shelter even of a bush.

It must be a matter of indifference to him whether he makes his bed at night among the wet grass, or upon the naked earth, baked for twelve hours by an almost vertical sun. In the coldest weather he can seldom hope for the shelter of a roof; and though the hot winds blow upon him like the blast of a furnace, and his skin cracks with very dryness, yet he must pass the greater part of his day in the saddle, ready at every instant to gallop off in pursuit of a stray steed, or to fly to the rescue of a young foal attacked by a ravenous wolf. The shepherd and the herdsman carry their houses with them. Their large wagons, that always accompany them on their wanderings, afford shelter from the weather, and a warm nest at night; but these are luxuries the tabunshick must not even dream of. His charges are much too lively to be left to their own guidance. His thousand horses are not kept together in as orderly and disciplined a fashion as those of a regiment of dragoons; and it may be doubted, whether an adjutant of cavalry has to ride about as much, and to give as many orders, on a day of battle, as a tabunshick on the quietest day that he spends in the Steppe. When on duty, a tabunshick, scarcely ever quits the back of his steed. He eats there, and even sleeps there: but he must beware of sleeping at the hours when other men sleep; for while grazing at night, the horses are most apt to wander away from the herd, and at no time is it more necessary for him to be on his guard against wolves, and against those adventurous dealers in horseflesh, who usually contrive that the money which they receive at a fair, shall consist exclusively of profit. During a snow-storm, the poor tabunshick must not think of turning his back to the tempest; this his horses are too apt to do, and it is his business to see that they do not take flight, and run scouring before the wind.

The dress of a tabunshick is chiefly composed of leather, fastened together by a leathern girdle, to which the whole veterinary apparatus, and a variety of little fanciful ornaments, are usually appended. His head is protected by a high cylindrical Tartar cap, of black lambskin; and over the whole he throws his sreeta, a large, brown, woollen cloak, with a hood to cover his head. This hood, in fine weather, hangs behind, and often serves its master at once for pocket and larder.

The tabunshick has a variety of other trappings, of which he never divests himself. Among these, his harabnick holds not the least important place. This is a whip, with a thick short stem, but with a thong often fifteen or eighteen feet in length. It is to him a sceptre that rarely quits his hand, and without which it would be difficult for him to retain his riotous subjects in anything like proper order. Next comes his sling, which he uses like the South American lasso, and with which he rarely misses the neck of the horse whose course he is desirous of arresting. The wolf club is another indispensable part of his equipment. This club which mostly hangs at the saddle, ready for immediate use, is three or four feet long, with a thick iron knob at the end. The tabunshicks acquire such astonishing dexterity in the use of this formidable weapon, that, at full gallop they will hurl it at a wolf, and rarely fail to strike the iron end into the prowling bandit’s head. The club, skilfully wielded, carries almost as sudden death with it as the rifle of an American back-woodsman. A cask of water must also accompany the tabunshick on every ride, for he can never know whether he may not be for days without coming to a well. A bag of bread, and a bottle of brandy are likewise his constant companions, besides a multitude of other little conveniences and necessaries, which are fastened either to himself, or his horse. Thus accoutred, the tabunshick sallies forth on a mission that keeps his dexterity and his power of endurance in constant exercise. His thousand untamed steeds have to be kept in order with no other weapon than his harabnick; and this, it may easily be supposed, is no easy task. His greatest trouble is with the stallions, who, after spending their ten or twelve years on the Steppe, without having once smelt the air of a stable, or felt the curb of a rein, become so ungovernable, that the tabunshick will sometimes threaten to throw up his office, unless such or such a stallion be expelled from the taboon.

Such constant exposures to fatigue and hardship, make the average life of a tabunshick extremely short. At the end of ten or fifteen years he is generally worn out, and unfit for such arduous duty. His pay therefore is proportionably high; for every tabunshick is a hired servant, as no serf could be impelled by any dread of punishment to exert that constant vigilance, without which the whole taboon would be broken up in a few days. What the fear of the whip, however, cannot effect in a slave, the hope of gain may insure from a freeman. The wages of a tabunshick are regulated by the number of horses committed to his care. For each horse he usually receives five or six rubles a year; so that the guardian of a full taboon may earn his six thousand rubles annually (£275), if he can keep the wolf and thief at bay; but every horse that is lost the tabunshick must pay for; and horse stealing is carried on so largely and dextrously on the Steppe, that he may sometimes lose half a year’s wages in a single night. He must also pay his assistants out of his own wages, and three assistants at least will be required to look after a taboon of a thousand horses. Notwithstanding all these drawbacks, however, the tabunshick, if he were vigilant and careful, might always save money; but few of them do so, and it rarely happens, that when invalided, they have hoarded together a little capital to enable them to embark in any more quiet occupation.

The hardships to which they are constantly exposed, and the high wages which they receive, make the tabunshicks the wildest dare-devils that can be imagined; so much so, that it is considered a settled point, that a man who has had the care of horses for two or three years, is unfit for any quiet, or settled kind of life. No one, of course, that can gain a tolerable livelihood in any other way, will embrace a calling that subjects him to so severe a life; and the consequence is, that it is generally from among the scamps of a village that servants are raised for this service. They are seldom without money, and when they do visit the brandy-shop, they are not deterred from abandoning themselves to a carouse by the financial considerations likely to restrain most men in the same rank of life. They ought, it is true, never to quit the taboon for a moment, but they will often spend whole nights in the little brandy-houses of the Steppe, drinking and gambling, and drowning in their fiery potations all recollections of the last day’s endurance. When their senses return with the returning day, they gallop after their herds, and display no little ingenuity in repairing the mischief that may have accrued from the carelessness of the preceding night.

The tabunshick lives in constant dread of the horse-stealer, and yet there is hardly a tabunshick on the Steppe that will not steal a horse if occasion presents itself. The traveller, who has left his horses to graze during the night, or the villager, who has allowed his cattle to wander away from his house, will do well to ascertain that there be no taboon in the vicinity, or in the morning he will look for them in vain. The tabunshick, meanwhile, takes care to rid himself, as soon as possible, of his stolen goods, by exchanging them away to the first brother herdsman that he meets, who again barters them away to another; so that in a few days, a horse that was stolen on the banks of the Dniepr, passes from hand to hand till it reaches the Bug or the Dniestr; and the rightful owner may still be inquiring after a steed, which has already quitted the empire of the Czar, to enter the service of a Moslem, or to figure in the stud of a Hungarian magnate. The tabunshicks have constantly little affairs of this kind to transact with one another, for which the Mongolian tumuli, scattered over the Steppe, afford convenient places of rendezvous.

Accustomed to a life of roguery and hardship, and indulging constantly in every kind of excess, the tabunshick comes naturally to be looked upon, by the more orderly class, as rather a suspicious character; but his friendship is generally worth having, and his ill-will is always dreaded. His very master stands a little in awe of him, for a tabunshick is not a servant that can be dismissed at a day’s notice. When the taboon has once become accustomed to him, the animals are not easily brought to submit to the control of a stranger. The tabunshick, moreover, has learned to know his horses; can tell the worth of each, can advise which to sell and which to keep, and knows where the best pasture ground may be looked for. Such a fellow, therefore, if intelligent and experienced, whatever his moral character may be, becomes necessary to his master, and, feeling this, is not long without presuming upon his conscious importance. He plays his wild pranks with impunity, and looks down with sovereign contempt upon the more decent members of society, particularly upon the more honest shepherds and cowherds, whom he considers, in every point of view, as an inferior race.

At the horse-fairs, the tabunshick is always a man of great importance; and it is amusing and interesting to see him, with his wild taboon, at Balta and Berditsheff, where are held the greatest fairs between the Dniepr and the Dniestr. The horses are driven into the market in the same free condition in which they range over the Steppe, for if tied together they would become entirely ungovernable. When driven through towns and villages, the creatures are often frightened; but that occasions no trouble to their drivers, for the herd is never more certain to keep together than when made timid by the appearance of a strange place. In the market-place the taboon is driven into an enclosure, near which the owner seats himself, and the tabunshick enters along with his horses. The buyers walk round to make their selection. They must not expect the horses to be trotted out for their inspection, as at Tattersall’s, but must judge for themselves as well as they can, with the comfortable reflection, that, after they have bought the animals, they will have ample time to become acquainted with them. “I have none but wild horses to sell,” the owner will say. “Look at them as long as you please. That horse I will warrant five years old, having bred him on my own Steppe. Further than that I know nothing of him. The price is a hundred rubles. Will you take him? If you say yes, I’ll order him to be caught; but I’d advise you to make the tabunshick a present, that he may take care not to injure the animal in catching it.” This last caution is by no means to be neglected, for a horse, carelessly caught, may be lamed for several weeks; and as the horse is never caught till the bargain has been concluded, any injury done to the animal is the buyer’s business, not the seller’s. If, on the other hand, the tabunshick be satisfied with the fee given him, he goes about his task in a much more methodical manner. The sling is thrown gently over the neck of the designated steed, but the latter is not thrown with the jerk to the ground. He is allowed for a little while to prance about at the full length of his tether, till his first fright be over. Gradually the wild animal becomes reconciled to the unwonted restraint, and the buyer leads him away quietly to his stable, where it will often take a year’s tuition to cure him of the vicious habits acquired on the Steppe.

After saying so much of the tabunshick, it will be but fair to give some account of the life led by the riotous animals committed to his charge. During what is called the fine season, from Easter to October, the taboon remains grazing day and night in the Steppe.

During the other six months of the year, the horses remain under shelter at night, and are driven out only in the day, when they must scrape away the snow for themselves, to get at the scanty grass underneath. When we say the horses remain under shelter, it must not be supposed that the shelter in question resembles in any way an English stable. The shelter alluded to consists of a space of ground enclosed by an earthen mound, with now and then something like a roof towards the north, to keep off the cold wind. There the poor creatures must defend themselves, as well as they can against the merciless Boreas, who comes to them unchecked in his course all the way from the pole. To a stranger it is quite harrowing to see the noble animals, in severe weather, in one of these unprotected enclosures. The stallions and the stronger beasts, take possession of the shed; the timid and feeble stand in groups about the wall, and creep closely together, in order to impart a little warmth to each other. Nor is it from cold that they have most to suffer on these occasions. Early in winter they still find a little autumnal grass under the snow, and the tabunshick scatters a little hay about the stable to help them to amuse the tedious hours of night. The customary improvidence of a Russian establishment, however, seldom allows a sufficient stock of hay, to be laid in for the winter. As the season advances, hay grows scarce, and must be reserved for the more valuable coach and saddle horses, and the tabunshick is obliged to content himself with a portion of the dry reeds and straw stored up for fuel. For these he has soon to battle it with the cook and the stove heaters, whose interest never fails to outweigh that of the poor taboon horses. These, if the winter last beyond the average term, are often reduced to the thatch of the roofs, and sometimes even eat away one another’s tails and manes; and that in a country where every year more grass is burnt during the summer, than would suffice to provide a profusion of hay, for a century of winters!—It will hardly be matter of surprise to any one, to learn that the winter is a season of sickness and death to the horses of the Steppe. After the mildest winter, the poor creatures come forth, a troop of sickly looking skeletons; but when the season has been severe, or unusually long, more than half of them, perhaps, have sunk under their sufferings, or have been so reduced in strength that the ensuing six months are hardly sufficient to restore them to their wonted spirits. The year 1833 was remarkably destructive to the taboons, and they had not recovered from its effects five years afterwards, when I last visited the Steppe. In such years of famine, the most enormous prices are sometimes paid for hay; yet every careful agriculturist may secure his cattle against such sufferings, by a little industry and forethought. In the proper season he may have as much hay as he pleases, for the mere trouble of cutting it; and such is the dryness of the climate during summer, that the hay may always be carried home, and stacked within a few hours after it has been mown.

From the hardships of an ordinary winter, the horses quickly recover amid the abundance of spring. A profusion of young grass covers the ground as soon as the snow has melted away. The crippled spectres that stalked about a few weeks before, with wasted limbs, and drooping heads, are as wild and mischievous at the end of the first month, as though they had never experienced the inconvenience of a six months’ fast. The stallions have already begun to form their separate factions in the taboon, and the neighing, bounding, prancing, gallopping, and fighting, goes on merrily from the banks of the Danube to the very heart of Mongolia.

In a taboon of a thousand horses, there are generally fifteen or twenty stallions, and four or five hundred brood mares. The stallions, and particularly the old ones, consider themselves the rightful lords of the community. They exercise their authority with very little moderation, and desperate battles are often fought among them, apparently for the mere honour of the championship. In almost every taboon there is one stallion who, by the rule of his hoof, has established a sort of supremacy, to which his comrades tacitly submit. Factions, cabals, and intrigues are not wanting. Sometimes there will be a general coalition against some particular stallion, who, if he get into a quarrel, is immediately set upon by ten or a dozen at once, and has no chance but to run for it. There is seldom a taboon without two or three of these objects of public animosity, who may be seen with a small troop of mares grazing apart from the main body of the herd.

The most tremendous battles are fought when two taboons happen to meet. In general, the tabunshicks are careful to keep at a respectful distance from each other; but sometimes they are away from their duty, and sometimes, when a right of pasturage is disputed, they bring their herds together out of sheer malice. The mares and foals on such occasions keep aloof, but their furious lords rush to battle with an impetuosity, of which those who are accustomed to see the horse only in a domesticated state, can form but a poor conception. Tho enraged animals lash their tails, and erect their manes like angry lions; their hoofs rattle against each other with such violence, that the noise can be heard at a considerable distance; they fasten on one another with their teeth like tigers; and their screamings and howlings are more like those of the wild beasts of the forests, than like any sounds ever heard from a tame horse. The victorious party is always sure to carry away a number of captive mares in triumph; and the exchange of prisoners is an affair certain to bring the tabunshicks and their men by the ears, if they have been able to keep themselves out of the battle till then.

The spring, though in so many respects a season of enjoyment, is not without its drawbacks. The wolves, also, have to indemnify themselves for the severe fast of the winter, and are just as desirous as the horses to get themselves into good condition again. The foals, too, are just then most delicate, and a wolf will any day prefer a young foal, to a sheep, or a calf. The wolf accordingly is constantly prowling about the taboon during the spring, and the horses are bound to be always prepared to do battle, in defence of the younger members of the community. The wolf, as the weaker party, trusts more to cunning than strength. For a party of wolves openly to attack a taboon at noon-day, would be to rush upon certain destruction; and, however severely the wolf may be pressed by hunger, he knows his own weakness too well, to venture on so absurd an act of temerity. At night, indeed, if the taboon happen to be a little scattered, and the wolves in tolerable numbers, they will sometimes attempt a rush, and a general battle ensues. An admirable spirit of coalition then displays itself among the horses. On the first alarm, stallions and mares come charging up to the threatened point, and attack the wolves with an impetuosity, that often puts the prowlers to instant flight. Soon, however, if they feel themselves sufficiently numerous, they return, and hover about the taboon, till some poor foal straggle a few yards from the main body, when it is seized by the enemy, while the mother, springing to its rescue, is nearly certain to share the same fate. Then it is that the battle begins in real earnest. The mares form a circle, within which the foals take shelter. We have seen pictures in which the horses are represented in a circle, presenting their hind hoofs to the wolves, who thus appear to have the free choice to fight, or to let it alone. Such pictures are the mere result of imagination, and bear very little resemblance to the reality; for the wolf has, in general, to pay much more dearly for his partiality to horseflesh. The horses, when they attack wolves, do not turn their tails towards them, but charge upon them in a solid phalanx, tearing them with their teeth, and trampling on them with their feet. The stallions do not fall into the phalanx, but gallop about with streaming tails, and curled manes, and seem to act, at once, as generals, trumpeters, and standard bearers. When they see a wolf, they rush upon him with reckless fury, mouth to mouth, or if they use their feet as weapons of defence, it is always with the front, and not the hinder hoof, that the attack is made. With one blow the stallion often kills his enemy, or stuns him. If so, he snatches the body up with his teeth, and flings it to the mares, who trample upon it till it becomes hard to say what kind of animal the skin belonged to. If the stallion, however, fail to strike a home blow at the first onset, he is likely to fight a losing battle, for eight or ten hungry wolves fasten on his throat, and never quit him till they have torn him to the ground: and if the horse be prompt and skilful in attack, the wolf is not deficient in sagacity, but watches for every little advantage, and is quick to avail himself of it; but let him not hope, even if he succeed in killing a horse, that he will be allowed leisure to pick the bones: the taboon never fails to take ample vengeance, and the battle almost invariably terminates in the complete discomfiture of the wolves, though not, perhaps, till more than one stallion has had a leg permanently disabled, or has had his side marked for life with the impress of his enemy’s teeth.

These grand battles happen but seldom, and when they do occur, it is probably always against the wolf’s wish. His system of warfare is a predatory one, and his policy is rather to surprise outposts, than to meditate a general attack. He trusts more to his cunning than his strength. He will creep cautiously through the grass, taking special care to keep to leeward of the taboon, and will remain concealed in ambush, till he perceive a mare and her foal grazing a little apart from the rest. Even then he makes no attempt to spring upon his prey, but keeps creeping nearer and nearer, with his head leaning on his fore feet, and wagging his tail in a friendly manner, to imitate, as much as possible, the movements and gestures of a watchdog. If the mare, deceived by the treacherous pantomime, venture near enough to the enemy, he will spring at her throat, and despatch her before she have time to raise an alarm; then, seizing on the foal, he will make off with his booty, and be out of sight perhaps before either herd or herdsman suspect his presence. It is not often, however, that the wolf succeeds in obtaining so easy a victory. If the mare detect him, an instant alarm is raised, and should the tabunshick be near, the wolf seldom fails to enrich him with a skin, for which the fur merchant is at all times willing to pay his ten or twelve rubles. The wolf’s only chance, on such occasions, is to make for the first ravine, down which he rolls head foremost, a gymnastic feat that the tabunshick on his horse cannot venture to imitate.

As the summer draws on, the wolf becomes less troublesome to the taboon; but a season now begins of severe suffering for the poor horses, who have more perhaps to endure from the thirst of summer, than from the hunger of winter. The heat becomes intolerable, and shade is nowhere to be found, save what the animals can themselves create, by gathering together in little groups, each seeking to place the body of his neighbour between himself and the burning rays of a merciless sun. The tabunshick often lays himself in the centre of the group, for he also has nowhere else a shady couch to hope for.

The autumn again is a season of enjoyment. The plains are anew covered with green, the springs yield once more an abundant supply of water, and the horses gather strength at this period of abundance, to prepare themselves for the sufferings and privations of winter. In autumn, for the first time in the year, the taboon is called on to work, but the work is not much more severe than the exertions which the restless creatures are daily imposing upon themselves, while romping and rioting about on the Steppe. The work in question is the thrashing of the corn.

A thrashing-floor, of several hundred yards square, is made, by cutting away the turf, and beating the ground into a hard, solid surface. The whole is enclosed by a railing, with a gate to let the horses in and out. On such a floor, supposing the taboon to consist of a thousand horses, five hundred score of sheaves will be laid down at once. The taboon is then formed into two divisions, and five hundred steeds are driven into the enclosure, stallions, mares, foals, and all, for when in, the more riotous they are the better the work will be done. The gate is closed, and then begins a ball of which it requires a lively imagination to conceive a picture. The drivers act as musicians, and their formidable harabnicks are the fiddles that keep up the dance without intermission.

The horses terrified, partly by the crackling straw under their feet, and partly by the incessant cracking of the whip over their heads, dart half frantic from one extremity to the other of their temporary prison. Millions of grains are flying about in the air, and the labourers without have enough to do to toss back the sheaves that are flung over the railing by the prancing, hard working thrashers within. This continues for about an hour. The horses are then let put, the corn turned, and the same performance repeated three times before noon. By that time a thousand sheffel of corn have been thrashed, after a fashion that looks more like a holiday diversion, than a hard day’s work; but in such ah operation, more corn is lost than is gained on many large farms in Germany.