Travels in the Steppes of the Caspian Sea, the Crimea, the Caucasus, &c.

by Xavier Hommaire de Hell; Adèle Hommaire de Hell

As will be seen from what we have stated above, the summer encampments of the Kalmuck hordes are situated in the most northern parts of the country, where there is the richest pasture, and where the cattle suffer least from flies in the hot weather. The emigration to the north is almost general; only a few very needy families, who have no cattle, remain in the winter camp, keeping as near as possible to the post stations and inhabited places, in hopes of procuring employment. In the beginning of the cold season the hordes return to the south, along the banks of the Caspian and the Kouma, where they fix themselves among the forests of rushes that supply them with firing and fodder for their cattle.

In all these regions destitute of forests, reeds are of immense importance, and nature has liberally distributed them along all the rivers of the steppes, and in all the numerous bottom lands that flank the Caspian. The inhabitants of Astrakhan make a regular and systematic use of them, employing them not only for fuel, but also for roofing their houses, and for thatching their waggons laden with salt or fish, which they send into the interior of the country. It is in spring, before the floods caused by the melting of the snow, that the reeds begin to sprout. Their stalks, which are as thick as a finger, soon shoot up to the height of twelve or thirteen feet. Those that grow on the banks of the Volga are never quite covered in the highest floods. The beginning of winter is the season for laying in a stock of reeds, and it is customary to burn all those that are not cut and carried off, in order that the dead stalks may not hinder the growth of the young shoots.

The ceremony attending the departure of the hordes in spring is not without interest. The Kalmuck chiefs never begin a march without making an offering to the Bourkhan, or god of the river, as an acknowledgment of the protection vouchsafed to their camp during the winter. To this end they repair in great pomp to the banks of the Kouma, accompanied by their families and a large body of priests, and throw several pieces of silver money into the river, at the same time invoking its future favours.

According to the official documents communicated to me, the Kalmuck population does not appear to exceed 15,000 families. On this head, however, it is impossible to arrive at very exact statistics, for the princes having themselves to pay the crown dues, have of course an interest in making the population seem as small as possible. I am inclined to believe, from sundry facts, that the number of the tents is scarcely under 20,000. At all events, it seems ascertained that the Kalmuck population has remained stationary for the last sixty years, a fact which is owing to the ravages of disease, such as small-pox, and others of the cutaneous kind.

The Kalmucks, all of them nomades, are exclusively engaged in rearing cattle, and know nothing whatever of agriculture. They breed camels, oxen, sheep, and above all, horses, of which they have an excellent description, small, but strong, agile, and of great endurance. I have ridden a Kalmuck horse often eighteen and even twenty-five leagues without once dismounting. The Russian cavalry is mounted chiefly on horses from the Caspian steppes: the average price of a good horse is from 80 to 100 rubles. Formerly the Kalmucks used to send their horses to the great fairs of Poland, paying a duty of 1.75 rubles on every horse sold; but the duty was raised to 5.25 rubles in 1828, for every horse arriving in the fair, and this unlucky measure immediately destroyed all trade with Poland. The business of horse-breeding has diminished immensely ever since in the Caspian steppes. The government afterwards returned to the old rate of duty; but the mischief was done, and the Kalmucks did not again appear in their old markets.

It is impossible to know, even approximately, the amount of cattle belonging to the tribes, for the Kalmucks are too superstitious ever to acknowledge the number of their stock. From various data I collected at Astrakhan, and from the superintendents of the hordes, we may estimate that the Kalmucks possess on the whole from 250,000 to 300,000 horses, about 60,000 camels, 180,000 kine, and nearly a million sheep.

Prince Tumene is the only one of the Kalmucks who has engaged in agriculture, and his attempts have been exceedingly favoured by the character of the soil in his domains on the left bank of the Volga. His produce consists of grain, grapes, and all kinds of fruit. He has even tried to manufacture Champagne wine, but with little success; and when we visited him, he entreated me to send him a good work on the subject, that he might begin his operations again on an improved plan.

Prince Tondoudof is also striving to follow in Prince Tumene's footsteps. He has lately marked out a large space in the steppes for the fixed residence of a part of his Kalmucks, but I greatly doubt that his wishes can ever be realised. He has for many years possessed a very handsome dwelling, but he has not yet been able to give up his tent, so strong is the attachment of all this race to a nomade life. But the most potent obstacle to the establishment of a permanent colony consists in the nature of the soil itself. We have traversed the Kalmuck steppes in almost all directions, and found everywhere only an argillaceous, sandy, or salt soil, generally unsuited to agriculture. Where there is pasture, the grass is so short and thin, that the ground exactly resembles the appearance of the steppes of the Black Sea, when the grass begins to grow again after the conflagrations of winter. Hence the Kalmucks are continually on the move to find fresh pasture for their cattle, and seldom remain in one spot for more than a month or six weeks. But the most serious obstacle to agriculture is the want of fresh water. The few brooks that run through the steppes are dry during the greater part of the year, and the summers are generally without rain. The cold, too, is as intolerable as the heat: for four months the thermometer is almost always steady at twenty-eight degrees of Reaumur in the shade, and very often it rises to thirty-two; then when winter sets in it falls to twenty-eight degrees below zero. Thus, there is a difference of nearly sixty degrees between the winter and the summer temperature. If in addition to these changes of temperature we consider the total flatness of the country, exposed without any shelter to the violence of the north and east winds, it will easily be conceived how unfavourable it must be to agriculture. A nomade life seems therefore to me a necessity for the Kalmucks, and until the development of civilisation among them shall make them feel the need of fixed dwellings, they must be left free to wander over their steppes. Moreover, in applying themselves exclusively to pastoral pursuits, they render much greater service to Russia than if they employed themselves in cultivating a stubborn and thankless soil. No doubt there are numerous oases scattered over these immense plains, just as in other deserts, and agriculture might have some success in the northern parts; but these favourable spots are all situated amid wildernesses where the cultivators would find no markets for their produce. In spite of all these drawbacks, the Russian government still persists in its endeavours to colonise the Kalmucks, and strives with all its might to introduce among them its system of uniformity. But its efforts have hitherto been quite fruitless; the hordes are now, perhaps, more than ever attached to their vagrant way of life, in which they find at least a compensation for the privileges and the independence of which they have been deprived.

The Kalmucks, like most other nations, are divided into three orders, nobles, clergy, and commons; the members of the aristocracy assume the name of white bones, whilst the common people are called black bones. The priests belong indifferently to either class, but those that issue from the ranks of the people do not easily succeed in effacing the stain of their origin. The prejudices of noble birth are, however, much less deeply rooted at this day than formerly, a natural consequence of the destruction of the power of the khans and the princes, and the complete subjection of the hordes to the laws and customs of the empire. Bergmann's account has therefore become quite inapplicable to the present state of things, and can only give false notions of the constitution of the Kalmucks.

Among the Asiatic races there is none whose features are so distinctly characterised as those of the Mongols. Paint one individual and you paint the whole nation. In 1815, the celebrated painter, Isabey, after seeing a great number of Kalmucks, observed so striking a resemblance between them, that having to take the likeness of Prince Tumene, and perceiving that the prince was very restless at the last sittings, he begged him to send one of his servants in his stead. In that way the painter finished the portrait, which turned out to be a most striking likeness, as I myself can testify. All the Kalmucks have eyes set obliquely, with eyelids little opened, scanty black eyebrows, noses deeply depressed near the forehead, prominent cheek-bones, spare beards, thin moustaches, and a brownish yellow skin. The lips of the men are thick and fleshy, but the women, particularly those of high rank, have heart-shaped mouths of no common beauty. All have enormous ears, projecting strongly from the head, and their hair is invariably black. The Kalmucks are generally small, but with figures well rounded, and an easy carriage. Very few deformed persons are seen among them, for with more good sense than ourselves, they leave the development of their children's frames entirely to nature, and never put any kind of garment on them until the age of nine or ten. No sooner are they able to walk, than they mount on horseback, and apply themselves with all their hearts to wrestling and riding, the chief amusements of the tribes.