The tribe that inhabits Dalin-Dalin is the Ingoosh, said to be descended from Englishmen, hence their name. An idea is current that the Crusaders used to go to the Holy Land by the old Georgian road, which for two thousand years has been the one recognised road over the Caucasus. A number of English were converted to Mahommedanism and settled in the mountains and took Caucasian women to wife. Their language has many words reminiscent of English, but I think the legend rather an unlikely story. It compares favourably with the myth that the Georgians are descended from the Egyptian army of Sesostris, who marched into the Caucasus and disappeared from their native land for ever more. And both stories find a companion in the explanation the priests give to the peasants that it was in the Caucasus that the Tower of Babel was built, the Babylonian Steeple, as they call it, and that the hundred different races and languages are the living proof of the confusion of tongues.
Just outside the village an Ingoosh chief rode up to me. He was a fine figure. He sat erect on a black horse; on his shoulder hung a black sheepskin cloak, his breast was ornamented by silver-mounted cartridge cases; at his belt of polished leather were pistol and dagger. A scimitar in a silver sheath lay across the shoulders of his horse and was attached to his belt by a light chain. His brows and hair were bushy and black, his eyes keen and domineering. He held the reins with one hand and kept wheeling his horse about. He was evidently in wrath and indignation; his aspect boded terror. I spoke first and greeted him.
“Hail!”
“Hail! Where are you from?”
“Dalin-Dalin.”
“Where are you going to?”
“The next village.”
“What do you mean?”
“The next village; I don’t know what it is called.”
“Why?”