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It was against these that those never-to-be-forgotten
operations, commanded by General Kaufmann, and carried
out by General Golovatcheff, were prosecuted with such
vigor and relentless cruelty after the fall of Khiva,
when they underwent such sufferings that it is doubtful
if they can ever recover from their effect. Both Mr.
MacGahan and Mr. Schuyler have exhausted this topic, and it is
only introduced here to show that the Khivan Yomuds must
have greatly fallen off in numbers. It is probable that
the Yomuds the Persian frontier and the Caspian, as well
as several islands in that sea as well, are computed to
number forty thousand tents; but, although this large
number may be exaggerated, Mr. Schuyler testifies to the
fact that one single encampment of the Tcharva branch of
the tribe numbered four thousand tents, while another of
the Ak Atabai consisted of half that number. It is
amongst the Yomuds that the Russians have been most
markedly busy, and the efforts of Lomakine, Markozof, and
others, have not been in vain in this quarter. Through
the intervention of the Russian authorities old feuds
have been settled, and bitter opponents reconciled to
each other. The Yomuds are divided into the two grand
divisions, the settled — Tchomura — and the
nomad — Tcharva; but there are clannish distinctions
of which we do not as yet possess full information. In
the khanate of Khiva itself there is a large colony of
Yomuds, who, it will be remembered, were chiefly settled
on the lake Aibughir, and played a certain part in the
Khivan campaign.
It was against these that those never-to-be-forgotten
operations, commanded by General Kaufmann, and carried
out by General Golovatcheff, were prosecuted with such
vigor and relentless cruelty after the fall of Khiva,
when they underwent such sufferings that it is doubtful
if they can ever recover from their effect. Both Mr.
MacGahan and Mr. Schuyler have exhausted this topic, and it is
only introduced here to show that the Khivan Yomuds must
have greatly fallen off in numbers. It is probable that
the Yomuds of the Atrek, and their
kinsmen of Khiva together amount to the total given by M. Vambery.
Their relations with Russia have within the last few
years been cordial, but it is permissible to believe that
the past is too clearly impressed upon the minds of the Yomuds
ever to be forgotten. Quite recently, too, they had cause
for complaint at the severe treatment of the Russian
authorities, who hired a large number of camels from
them, and when many of these were lost upon the steppe
refused to give any compensation for them. This is an old
trick that has often been played the natives by Russia.
It has done service often enough, but its virtue does not
yet appear to be extinct. From the reports which reach us
through Teheran from Bojnurd,
and even from narratives that have appeared in the
“Tiflis Gazette," it is patent that there is
great dissatisfaction among the Yomuds at this harsh
treatment. The Yomuds do not possess any large number of
camels, and consequently the loss is to them doubly
severe. Such acts as these cannot but generate in the
bosom of the Yomuds not the best-disposed of human
creatures feelings of hatred against Russia that must
sooner or later manifest themselves ; and as the event
has only occurred recently, there has not been a
sufficient interval for its results to be rendered
perceptible.
The
great tribe of the Ersari, who hold the left banks of the
Oxus from Charjui to Kahoka Salish and perhaps also to
some distance within Afghan territory, are the least
known of all these tribes, and except at the passages a
peace-loving and good-tempered set of people, of whom it
would be interesting to procure further information.
Their number has been computed at as many as fifty
thousand tents, or a quarter of a million of people. This
is, however, derived from very vague authority, and all
we know for certain is that there are about five thousand
in and near Charjui, and about the same number at Kerkhi.
There are also settlements of this tribe at Kilif and
Balkh itself.
South of the Ersari are the Alieli (Alili), a much
smaller clan, who are confined to the small khanate of
Andchoy. Their number is probably under twelve thousand
people; and if Ferrier's inquiries may be trusted, these
are not a distinct tribe, but only a
branch of the Tekes who were removed to Andchoy in the
reign of Shah Abbas the Great. He calls
them descendants of the Afshars — that tribe of which
Nadir Shah was a member. We then come to the Kara
tribe, which occupies the desert between Andchoy and
Merv, but of them we know less than of either the Alieli
or Ersari. Professor
Vambery computes their numbers at one thousand five
hundred tents, or seven thousand five hundred persons.
Their political importance is practically nil, and so far
as it is possible to express an unhesitating opinion,
these clans on the frontiers of Afghan Turkestan are of
considerably less importance than their kinsmen further
west. In the triangle formed by lines drawn between the
three points, Charjui, Khoja Salih, and Shiborgan, there
live these tribes, the Ersari, the Alieli, and the Kara,
with a total approximate strength of seventy thousand
persons. These are scattered over so large a surface, and
the soil they till is so barren, that they possess
neither the cohesion nor the resources to play any great
part. The chances are that if the opportunity were
offered them they would eagerly take up their residence
within Afghan Turkestan, and speedily become merged in
the Uzbek population. The Turkmen of Merv and the region
of Sarakhs and Dereges
are for every reason the most important of all the
Turkmen, and these are divided into three clans, the Teke,
the
Salor, and the Sarik. The clan,
which in happier days possessed Merv, has been ousted
from its post of vantage on the Murghab, and compelled to
seek in the country to the south that sanctuary which the
superiority of the Tekes obliged it to discover. Its
head-quarters are now round Martshag or Merutshag; but it
is highly improbable that this clan still possesses
anything like the forty thousand persons which Professor
Vambery estimated it to number. It is possible that the
Salor have recognised the necessity of war and have
become subservient to the domineering Tekes. But on
the other hand they may be biding their time in the hope
of turning the tables upon their rivals. The Saryk
clan, which is rather more peacefully inclined than the
tribes to the north, holds the country close in on the
Afghan frontier towards Herat. Many of the two tribes are
Afghan subjects, and the numbers of the Sarik are
certainly not over-stated at fifty thousand persons.
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