The Lake of Tengis, near the frightful Desert of Kobi,
lay in a hollow amongst hills of a moderate height, ranging
generally from two to three thousand feet high. About
eleven o'clock in the forenoon, the Chinese cavalry
reached the summit of a road which led through a cradle-like
dip in the mountains right down upon the margin of
the lake. From this pass, elevated about two thousand
feet above the level of the water, they continued to 5
descend, by a very winding and difficult road, for an hour
and a half; and during the whole of this descent they were
compelled to be inactive spectators of the fiendish spectacle
below. The Kalmucks, reduced by this time from
about six hundred thousand souls to two hundred and 10
sixty thousand, and after enduring for two months and a
half the miseries we have previously described—outrageous
heat, famine, and the destroying scimiter of the
Kirghises and the Bashkirs—had for the last ten days
been traversing a hideous desert, where no vestiges were 15
seen of vegetation, and no drop of water could be found.
Camels and men were already so overladen that it was a
mere impossibility that they should carry a tolerable sufficiency
for the passage of this frightful wilderness. On
the eighth day the wretched daily allowance, which had 20
been continually diminishing, failed entirely; and thus, for
two days of insupportable fatigue, the horrors of thirst
had been carried to the fiercest extremity. Upon this
last morning, at the sight of the hills and the forest
scenery, which announced to those who acted as guides 25
the neighborhood of the Lake of Tengis, all the people
rushed along with maddening eagerness to the anticipated
solace. The day grew hotter and hotter, the people more
and more exhausted; and gradually, in the general rush
forward to the lake, all discipline and command were lost—all 30
attempts to preserve a rear guard were neglected—the
wild Bashkirs rode on amongst the encumbered people
and slaughtered them by wholesale, and almost
without resistance. Screams and tumultuous shouts proclaimed
the progress of the massacre; but none heeded—none
halted; all alike, pauper or noble, continued to rush
on with maniacal haste to the waters—all with faces
blackened by the heat preying upon the liver and with
tongue drooping from the mouth. The cruel Bashkir was 5
affected by the same misery, and manifested the same
symptoms of his misery, as the wretched Kalmuck; the
murderer was oftentimes in the same frantic misery as his
murdered victim—many, indeed (an ordinary effect of
thirst), in both nations had become lunatic, and in this 10
state, whilst mere multitude and condensation of bodies
alone opposed any check to the destroying scimiter and
the trampling hoof, the lake was reached; and to that
the whole vast body of enemies rushed, and together
continued to rush, forgetful of all things at that moment 15
but of one almighty instinct. This absorption of the
thoughts in one maddening appetite lasted for a single
half hour; but in the next arose the final scene of parting
vengeance. Far and wide the waters of the solitary lake
were instantly dyed red with blood and gore: here rode a 20
party of savage Bashkirs, hewing off heads as fast as the
swaths fall before the mower's scythe; there stood unarmed
Kalmucks in a death grapple with their detested foes,
both up to the middle in water, and oftentimes both sinking
together below the surface, from weakness or from 25
struggles, and perishing in each other's arms. Did the
Bashkirs at any point collect into a cluster for the sake
of giving impetus to the assault? Thither were the camels
driven in fiercely by those who rode them, generally
women or boys; and even these quiet creatures were 30
forced into a share in this carnival of murder by trampling
down as many as they could strike prostrate with the
lash of their fore-legs. Every moment the water grew
more polluted; and yet every moment fresh myriads came
up to the lake and rushed in, not able to resist their
frantic thirst, and swallowing large draughts of water,
visibly contaminated with the blood of their slaughtered
compatriots. Wheresoever the lake was shallow enough
to allow of men raising their heads above the water, there, 5
for scores of acres, were to be seen all forms of ghastly
fear, of agonizing struggle, of spasm, of death, and the
fear of death—revenge, and the lunacy of revenge—until
the neutral spectators, of whom there were not a
few, now descending the eastern side of the lake, at length 10
averted their eyes in horror. This horror, which seemed
incapable of further addition, was, however, increased
by an unexpected incident. The Bashkirs, beginning to
perceive here and there the approach of the Chinese
cavalry, felt it prudent—wheresoever they were sufficiently 15
at leisure from the passions of the murderous
scene—to gather into bodies. This was noticed by the
governor of a small Chinese fort built upon an eminence
above the lake; and immediately he threw in a broadside,
which spread havoc among the Bashkir tribe. As often 20
as the Bashkirs collected into globes and turms as their
only means of meeting the long line of descending
Chinese cavalry, so often did the Chinese governor of the
fort pour in his exterminating broadside; until at length
the lake, at its lower end, became one vast seething 25
caldron of human bloodshed and carnage. The Chinese
cavalry had reached the foot of the hills; the Bashkirs,
attentive to their movements, had formed; skirmishes had
been fought; and, with a quick sense that the contest was
henceforward rapidly becoming hopeless, the Bashkirs 30
and Kirghises began to retire. The pursuit was not as
vigorous as the Kalmuck hatred would have desired.
But, at the same time, the very gloomiest hatred could
not but find, in their own dreadful experience of the
Asiatic deserts, and in the certainty that these wretched
Bashkirs had to repeat that same experience a second
time, for thousands of miles, as the price exacted by a
retributary Providence for their vindictive cruelty—not
the very gloomiest of the Kalmucks, or the least reflecting, 5
but found in all this a retaliatory chastisement more
complete and absolute than any which their swords and
lances could have obtained or human vengeance could
have devised.
Here ends the tale of the Kalmuck wanderings in the 10
Desert; for any subsequent marches which awaited them
were neither long nor painful. Every possible alleviation
and refreshment for their exhausted bodies had been
already provided by Kien Long with the most princely
munificence; and lands of great fertility were immediately 15
assigned to them in ample extent along the River Ily, not
very far from the point at which they had first emerged
from the wilderness of Kobi. But the beneficent attention
of the Chinese Emperor may be best stated in his own
words, as translated into French by one of the Jesuit 20
missionaries: "La nation des Torgotes (savoir les Kalmuques)
arriva à Ily, toute delabrée, n'ayant ni de quoi vivre, ni de quoi
se vêtir. Je l'avais prévu; et j'avais
ordonné de faire en tout genre les provisions nécessaires
pour pouvoir les secourir promptement: c'est ce qui a été 25
exécuté. On a fait la division des terres: et on a assigné
à chaque famille une portion suffisante pour pouvoir servir
à son entretien, soit en la cultivant, soit en y nourissant
des bestiaux. On a donné à chaque particulier des étoffes
pour l'habiller, des grains pour se nourrir pendant l'éspace 30
d'une année, des ustensiles pour le ménage et d'autres
choses nécessaires: et outre cela plusieurs onces d'argent,
pour se pourvoir de ce qu'on aurait pu oublier. On a
designé des lieux particuliers, fertiles en pâturages; et on
leur a donné des boeufs, moutons, etc., pour qu'ils pussent
dans la suite travailler par eux-mêmes à leur entretien et
à leur bien-être."
These are the words of the Emperor himself, speaking 5
in his own person of his own paternal cares; but another
Chinese, treating the same subject, records the munificence
of this prince in terms which proclaim still more
forcibly the disinterested generosity which prompted, and
the delicate considerateness which conducted, this extensive 10
bounty. He has been speaking of the Kalmucks,
and he goes on thus:—"Lorsqu'ils arrivèrent sur nos
frontières (au nombre de plusieurs centaines de mille,
quoique la fatigue extrême, la faim, la soif, et toutes les
autres incommodités inséparables d'une très-longue et 15
très-pénible route en eussent fait périr presque autant),
ils étaient réduits à la dernière misère; ils manquaient
de tout. Il" (viz. l'empereur, Kien Long) "leur fit préparer
des logemens conformes à leur manière de vivre;
il leur fit distribuer des alimens et des habits; il leur fit 20
donner des boeufs, des moutons, et des ustensiles, pour
les mettre en état de former des troupeaux et de cultiver
la terre, et tout cela à ses propres frais, qui se sont
montés à des sommes immenses, sans compter l'argent
qu'il a donné à chaque chef-de-famille, pour pouvoir à la 25
subsistance de sa femme et de ses enfans."
Thus, after their memorable year of misery, the Kalmucks
were replaced in territorial possessions, and in
comfort equal, perhaps, or even superior, to that which
they had enjoyed in Russia, and with superior political 30
advantages. But, if equal or superior, their condition
was no longer the same; if not in degree, their social
prosperity had altered in quality; for, instead of being a
purely pastoral and vagrant people, they were now in
circumstances which obliged them to become essentially
dependent upon agriculture; and thus far raised in social
rank that, by the natural course of their habits and the
necessities of life, they were effectually reclaimed from
roving and from the savage customs connected with a half 5
nomadic life. They gained also in political privileges,
chiefly through the immunity from military service which
their new relations enabled them to obtain. These were
circumstances of advantage and gain. But one great
disadvantage there was, amply to overbalance all other 10
possible gain: the chances were lost, or were removed to
an incalculable distance, for their conversion to Christianity,
without which in these times there is no absolute
advance possible on the path of true civilization.
One word remains to be said upon the personal interests 15
concerned in this great drama. The catastrophe in this
respect was remarkable and complete. Oubacha, with all
his goodness and incapacity of suspecting, had, since the
mysterious affair on the banks of the Torgau, felt his
mind alienated from his cousin; he revolted from the man 20
that would have murdered him; and he had displayed his
caution so visibly as to provoke a reaction in the bearing
of Zebek-Dorchi and a displeasure which all his dissimulation
could not hide. This had produced a feud, which,
by keeping them aloof, had probably saved the life of 25
Oubacha; for the friendship of Zebek-Dorchi was more
fatal than his open enmity. After the settlement on the
Ily this feud continued to advance, until it came under
the notice of the Emperor, on occasion of a visit which
all the Tartar chieftains made to his Majesty at his hunting 30
lodge in 1772. The Emperor informed himself accurately
of all the particulars connected with the transaction—of
all the rights and claims put forward—and of the
way in which they would severally affect the interests of
the Kalmuck people. The consequence was that he
adopted the cause of Oubacha, and repressed the pretensions
of Zebek-Dorchi, who, on his part, so deeply
resented this discountenance to his ambitious projects
that, in conjunction with other chiefs, he had the presumption 5
even to weave nets of treason against the Emperor
himself. Plots were laid, were detected, were baffled;
counter-plots were constructed upon the same basis,
and with the benefit of the opportunities thus offered.
Finally, Zebek-Dorchi was invited to the imperial lodge, 10
together with all his accomplices; and, under the skilful
management of the Chinese nobles in the Emperor's
establishment, the murderous artifices of these Tartar
chieftains were made to recoil upon themselves, and the
whole of them perished by assassination at a great imperial 15
banquet. For the Chinese morality is exactly of
that kind which approves in everything the lex talionis:
"... Lex nec justior ulla est [as they think]
Quam necis artifices arte perire sua."
So perished Zebek-Dorchi, the author and originator of 20
the great Tartar Exodus. Oubacha, meantime, and his
people were gradually recovering from the effects of their
misery, and repairing their losses. Peace and prosperity,
under the gentle rule of a fatherly lord paramount,
redawned upon the tribes: their household lares, after so 25
harsh a translation to distant climates, found again a
happy reinstatement in what had, in fact, been their
primitive abodes: they found themselves settled in quiet
sylvan scenes, rich in all the luxuries of life, and endowed
with the perfect loveliness of Arcadian beauty. But from 30
the hills of this favored land, and even from the level
grounds as they approach its western border, they still
look out upon that fearful wilderness which once beheld
a nation in agony—the utter extirpation of nearly half a
million from amongst its numbers, and for the remainder
a storm of misery so fierce that in the end (as happened
also at Athens during the Peloponnesian war from a different 5
form of misery) very many lost their memory; all
records of their past life were wiped out as with a sponge
—utterly erased and cancelled: and many others lost
their reason; some in a gentle form of pensive melancholy,
some in a more restless form of feverish delirium 10
and nervous agitation, and others in the fixed forms of
tempestuous mania, raving frenzy, or moping idiocy.
Two great commemorative monuments arose in after
years to mark the depth and permanence of the awe—
the sacred and reverential grief, with which all persons
looked back upon the dread calamities attached to the 15
year of the tiger—all who had either personally shared
in those calamities and had themselves drunk from that
cup of sorrow, or who had effectually been made witnesses
to their results and associated with their relief: two great
monuments; one embodied in the religious solemnity, 20
enjoined by the Dalai-Lama, called in the Tartar language
a Romanang—that is, a national commemoration, with
music the most rich and solemn, of all the souls who
departed to the rest of Paradise from the afflictions of the
Desert (this took place about six years after the arrival 25
in China); secondly, another, more durable, and more
commensurate to the scale of the calamity and to the
grandeur of this national Exodus, in the mighty columns
of granite and brass erected by the Emperor, Kien Long,
near the banks of the Ily. These columns stand upon 30
the very margin of the steppes, and they bear a short but
emphatic inscription[10] to the following effect:—
By the Will of God,
Here, upon the Brink of these Deserts,
Which from this point begin and stretch away,
Pathless, treeless, waterless,
For thousands of miles, and along the margins of many mighty 5
Nations,
Rested from their labors and from great afflictions
Under the shadow of the Chinese Wall,
And by the favor of Kien Long, God's Lieutenant upon Earth,
The ancient Children of the Wilderness—the Torgote Tartars— 10
Flying before the wrath of the Grecian Czar,
Wandering Sheep who had strayed away from the Celestial Empire
in the year 1616,
But are now mercifully gathered again, after infinite sorrow,
Into the fold of their forgiving Shepherd. 15
Hallowed be the spot
and
Hallowed be the day—September 8, 1771!
Amen.