Oldalképek
PDF
ePub
[blocks in formation]

66

[ocr errors]

"You can't do better, Skeffy. Help yourself, and open your budget of news.' Well, the news is the best anyway, and will improve your appetite. I've just come from the race-course. There was a meeting of the stewards this morning about the race for the maharajah's cup. It seems that it was suspected something was shady about that horse Songster, and his history was inquired into, and they have the best evidence that he is five years old instead of being four as he was entered, so he carried four pound too little in the race. Of course he has been disqualified, so your horse won after all. I congratulate you on winning the cup and taking all the money out of the lotteries."

What a reprieve! I felt as if I had been relieved from an oppressive and inordinate weight that had loaded me for the last two days. Skeffy's rather homely and matterof-fact countenance seemed surrounded with a halo of light, and I blessed the stewards for their prompt and energetic action. If only the disasters of the regimental ball could also be reversed, there would be no happier captain of hussars in her Majesty's service.

"One peon brought chit for master," and Ramasawmy handed me a note, on whose envelope was a cipher that I knew well. I opened it.

"DEAR CAPTAIN WILMOT, - I was so sorry to hear of your accident last night, and hope you will soon get over it. It may help your recovery to tell you that I have just been riding with Kitty Clover, and we had a long talk about you. I was able to explain a misunderstanding that seems to have occurred at your ball, and, if you call, I think she will be glad to see you. You have my best wishes. Yours very sincerely,

"CLARA FORTESCUE."

[blocks in formation]

From The Asiatic Quarterly Review. RUSSIA AND NORTHERN ASIA.

BY A. VAMBERY.

IN speaking of northern Asia, or Siberia, as it is termed by the Russians, we must understand that we are treating of a vast continent and conglomeration of countries of nearly five million square miles, of a portion of the globe most diversely constituted, and subjected to various and extreme climatic conditions. Ice-bound regions and perilous Tundras alternate under changing skies with flow. ering meadows and the verdant steppe; man, too, like nature, exhibits variety, and bears the stamp of races the most diverse; the transitions which his historic past has undergone are scarcely suspected, but the firmly established circumstance that the Voguls and Ostyaks, who now live in the far north, are in close philological connection with the Magyars settled on the Danube and Theiss, south of the Carpathians, alone suffices to astonish us, and to create an interest in the wanderings, history, and past experiences of the present dwellers in northern Asia. Another bond of kinship, a chain of loose and single links, and often severed by the storms and ravages of time, connects these very north Asiatics with the Finus of north-eastern Europe; and if, at the same time, it is taken into consideration that records of relationship exist between the present inhabitants of Siberia's remotest regions and the western half of Asia, it will become the more evident that the ethnical kaleidoscope of the north of Asia contains riddles the most obscure. In most countries of the Old World the historical era reaches back to centuries before Christ; but here the dim light of historical remembrance has only arisen in modern times, and in the pitch-dark past we seek vainly for light-shedding stars to guide us. Conjectures only and vague surmises are at our command. We may presume that the country of the Uigurs, which extended from the north-west of China far into the north to the banks of the Ob and Yenissei, may also have sent a few rays of culture to those distant climes, for the Russian name Ugor or Ugr is really derived from Uigur; but what may have been the precise influence of the Uigurs' rule on the Finnish-Ugrian and Turko-Tartar race elements can hardly be determined. No more light is thrown on the subject by the mention, in Chinese annals, of the departure of the Hiungnu (Huns) towards the

[ocr errors][merged small]
[graphic]

west. There is no doubt that in the large | people living so completely in a state of army of Attila most of the peoples of nature as those of northern Asia. Indeed, northern Asia were represented. The it was necessary that it should have a simphilological evidence of Magyar shows clearly and conclusively that the amalgamation of people at the middle Danube and the Theiss consists of descendants of Turks, Voguls, Ostyaks, Syryanes, and Mongols, though the how and the when of this remarkable fusion is shrouded in obscurity. The data that have reached us, in consequence of the intercourse of the principality of great Novgorod in the eleventh, twelfth, and fourteenth centuries with the nations in the north-east, are equally deficient. The expeditions of Ulyeb (1032), Danslav Lazutnitch (1169), Yadreya (1193), and later Russian generals, into the country of the Yugrians, were merely for the purpose of periodical plunder and rapine, and in accordance with the spirit of the age. They could not lead to any important political or social changes, and were in no case of such significance to northern Asia as the rise of Jengis Khan, who, like Attila, set in motion, in the distant north, a sea of nations by his world-storming career, and carried some of its waves up to the eastern frontier of Europe.

ilar disintegrating and destructive tendency as is noticed in America, Australia, and everywhere where men of a higher state settle by the side of men of a lower state of culture. Even in its very first appearance, Christian-Western influence was quite distinct from its Moslem and Buddhistic predecessors. The latter vehicles of civilization proceeded with extreme slowness, without energy, but with all the greater self-reliance and confidence in the infallibility of their spiritual operations; the Russians, on the contrary, in the protection of their material strength, advanced uninterruptedly, boldly, and with perseverance on their way towards the East. Yadrinzow is quite right when he compares Russian immigration into northern Asia with an army pressing on eastward, which initially advances in compact masses; later on, in lesser numbers, and eventually is completely lost, like a river in the sandy steppe. The Russian national element, though certainly, through indigenous admixture, different from the Russian type of the mother country, extends at the present day from the Ural to the TunTaking everything into consideration, guska; it is in thick masses in the district we can therefore only fix the sixteenth between Verchoturje, Troitzk, Tobolsk, century as the period in which, through and Petropaulowsk, but gradually dethe successful enterprise of Yermak, north-creases further towards the East. ern Asia first came to have uninterrupted communication with the west, through its representative, Russia; since that period our information regarding the north of the old mother-continent has constantly increased.

The Russians, in the expedition undertaken in the sixteenth century, came into conflict with primitive people who were, with the exception of those who had a varnish of Moslem civilization, of the lowest state of culture, and absolutely defenceless against the invaders. These naturally had to share the fate of their colleagues in America and Australia. The origin of these races was Finnish-Ugrian, Turko-Tartar, Samoyed, Tunguzian, and Mongolian.

Up to that era northern Asia from time to time furnished the battle-ground for two rival systems of Asiatic civilization, corresponding to the religions of Buddhism and Islam. Both had undertaken the battle against Shamanism with some success. The teaching of Buddha, under the The inevitable results of this reciprocal protection of the Jengisides, had spread intercourse between primitive people, to the Buryats, who now live near the An-chiefly engaged in fishing, the chase, and gara; and Islam, starting partly from the middle Volga, and partly from Bokhara, had found adherents as far as the banks of the Tobol. With the appearance, and the eventual establishment of the Russians, Christianity entered the arena as a third factor of civilization; and though, in the rivalry of these three civilizing agents, victory was on the side of the strictly Asiatic religions, it was yet impossible to prevent the material superiority of the Western invaders from exercising a most remarkable influence on the destiny of

the breeding of cattle, and the Russians, illuminated by a few stray rays of Western civilization, could not but be most unfavorable to the former. Crowded out from the districts more capable of cultivation, plagued and tormented by government experiments and oppressive taxation, and in addition over-reached in every respect by Russian traders and artisans, the natives

"Sibirien, geographische, ethnographishe, und his vervollständigt von Dr. Ed. Petri. Jena, 1886 Seite torische." Studien von N. Jadrinzow, bearbeitet und 10.

[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors]

were forced to leave the territory in pro- | and true love of mankind shown by indi-
portion as Russian immigration increased. vidual Russian travellers and scholars,
The chase did not even yield sufficient whose noble and humane efforts are in the
return for satisfying the taxes that had to direction of improving the condition of the
be paid in valuable furs; the breeding of natives, who are suffering under the cruel
cattle decreased; and though, perhaps, errors and shortcomings of Russian ad-
the Russian government only intended to ministration defects which have been
squeeze out the very utmost from the so well exposed by Shashkow, Ssokolow,
people, yet physical degeneration and a Polyakow, and especially Yadrinzow.
fearful diminution of the population grad- Much misery might be mitigated, much
ually set in. Several tribes, as the Omoks, misfortune perhaps partly averted; but at
Kotts, Khoidans, Shelags, Anjuits, Mators, present, remembering the similar cases in
Assans, Arinzes, and others, have com- America and Australia, it seems certain
pletely disappeared (Petri, 106); and how that a complete cure of the evil- that is,
terrible was the effect of this war of ex- a state leading to independent national de-
termination on the other tribes found velopment, evolving out of itself its own
scattered here and there may best be gath- civilization - could never be effected, and
ered from the following statistical figures. would ever remain merely a desideratum
In the year 1744 there were 20,000 of the philanthropist. A cultural trans-
Kamchadalians of both sexes; in 1823, formation on a national basis is only
2,760; and in 1850, only 1,951. In the possible with a people whose state of civil-
district of Berezow there were, in 1816, ization, evolved from or attached to its
21,000 natives; in 1828, only 19,652; that moral and physical peculiarities, can form
is, a decrease of 1,349 in twelve years. a suitable stepping-stone towards the de-
In the circuit of Tomsk and the district of sired change. The justice of this state-
Narym, 10,135 natives of both sexes were ment is very apparent in the instances of
counted in 1816; in 1832, only 9,724. In Turkey, India, and Japan; but with a peo-
twenty-two volosts of the circuit Kusnetzk, ple of the lowest state of culture, under
there were, in the year 1827, 5,160 natives; the influence of Shamanism, as is the case
in the year 1832, 4,399, a diminution of with the natives of northern Asia, such a
761. The farther north we proceed the transformation is quite impossible.
more dreadful is the decrease of popula-
tion among the natives. Several tribes,
like the Voguls and Koibals, are quite on
the point of total extinction. The Hunga-
rian traveller, Reguly, for instance, esti-
mates the number of Voguls in the year
1845 at 20,000; whilst according to Pro-
fessor Ahlquist their number in the year
1858 hardly amounted to 6,500 souls; and
quite recently even this remnant is said
to have decreased, as Rittich gives their
number as 4,527 only. It is indeed to be
feared that the sad event of the last of the
Tasmanians will find a repetition in many
a part of northern Asia.

The indisputable fact regarding the decrease of the indigenous population of northern Asia, cannot be explained by any absorption into the ruling race.

In the Russian population of Siberia, which at present amounts to two-thirds of the whole population, only a very small percentage of indigenous element can be found absorbed. The increase of the Russian element was chiefly due to voluntary or compulsory immigration; and the natives simply perished, the victims of an overwhelming majority of invaders, of economic conditions, and insufficient foresight on the part of the government.

We fully approve of the warm patriotism

We generally find the opinion prevailing that Russia, by means of regulating the ratio of taxation, by energetic sanitary measures, and by encouraging settled in contradistinction to nomadic life, might have improved the economic condition of the indigenous population, and could thereby have opened to them the portals of foreign civilization; but in holding this view, it is forgotten that in Asia, more than anywhere else, religion is all-powerful, and is the sole agent through which social changes can be effected.

With regard to this point, Russia was brought face to face with a most difficult problem. It had to enter the lists against two powerful Asiatic religions, namely, Islam and Buddhism - two civilizing agents that are exactly suited to the Asiatic taste and cast of mind, and much more directly reach the goal than Christianity, even than Russian Christianity, which, in spite of its many Asiatic features, still appears to the true Asiatic a foreign and unpalatable production. Knowing this, and fully aware of the bearing and difficulty of the question, the Russian government made an attempt in the last century to aid the propagation of Islam, by paying mollas and ordering mosques to be built. This arrangement failed in its object, because,

[graphic]

instead of producing the advantages of a vehicle or a stepping-stone towards a further object, or, to be quite clear, instead of forming a suitable Moslem foundation for the future Christian Church, Islam only, as such, was strengthened, and in Islam a force inimical to Western civilization. Thus we find, that whilst, before Russian immigration, Muhammadanism, at the banks of the Tobol, had only just effected an entrance, Russian supremacy very materially aided the spread of this religion. The Tatars of the Baraba Steppe entered the fold of Islam in 1745; that is, one and a half century after this region had came under Russian influence. Of the 142,191 aborigines of the governments of Tobolsk and Tomsk, 47,320 are Muhammadans. Adding to these the 788,000 Siberian Kirgises, also adherents of Islam, we see that the Moslem religion can here register one of its greatest conquests (Petri, 139). With regard to Buddhism the case is similar.

In the year 1741 the majority of Burjates in eastern Siberia were Shamanists, and the Buddhists only had two Dzazanes and 150 Lamas; in 1845 there were 85,060 Buddhists and 3,546 Lamas; in 1848, 125,000 Buddhists and 4.546 Lamas; and at present the Burjates are nearly all Buddhists, and Shamanism is quite in the minority. Of the population of 2,792,365 inhabitants of the governments Tobolsk and Tomsk under Irkutsk, there are, at the present day, only 143,262 heathens, or adherents of Shamanism.

In the eighteenth century the task of converting the indigenous population straightway to Christianity was begun, and in modern times it is continued with still greater energy; but whether, under the existing circumstances, the results will correspond to the expectations of the Russian government is very doubtful. All possible ways and means were tried to induce people to accept Christianity; force, promises, and every kind of allurement were used; and when it became apparent that the teaching of Christ in the Russian idiom did not find favor, the experiment was made whether it would be more acceptable in the language of the natives. The Altaic mission thereupon began to study the Altaic language, and produced a very good primer of that language in Russian; but in spite of prodigious patience, labor, and sacrifice, the results hitherto achieved are of the most modest kind. According to the report of this mission, consisting of twelve missionaries and twenty-two ecclesiastics, nearly

five thousand Teleuts, Shors, Forest-Tar tars, etc., have entered the fold of the Greek Church during the last fifty years. The Christianity of these people, however, must not be too closely inquired into. Their apostasy from the ancient creed of their forefathers separates these neophytes from all intercourse with their own kin; and the new mode of life naturally arising from the new doctrine only too often renders their condition one of misery and poverty; they belong neither to one party nor to the other, and in the absence of a basis of belief they generally perish.

A modern Russian traveller writes about the five thousand Ostyaks whom the Siberian archbishop Philoteus is said to have baptized in the year 1712, that they are only nominal Christians; the holy pictures in their possession are kept under a bench in some distant corner of their huts; it is only on the arrival of a priest that they are taken from their hiding-place. Rittich is quite right in his assertion that Christianity there is merely like a light covering of moss, hiding the marsh of Shamanism. The converts of other tribes are not very different; those who without forethought have embraced the new religion declare their repentance afterwards. The way a Tshuktsh expressed himself on the point to a missionary is very characteristic: "When I was young the Russians were very friendly to me, and I allowed myself to be baptized; but now I look with different eyes on the past. I look on it with the eyes of an old man, and I ask what baptism has brought us? The people have become poor, their flocks have decreased; the reindeer perish, and so do the men themselves; old men are hardly to be found, and many have died not as men die. No, let me meet death my own way, and die like a man (Petri, 149).

[ocr errors]

Conversion to Christianity, therefore, is not by any means a prevention against the gradual extinction of north Asiatics. The nature of the Slavic educational system is equally unable to afford a remedy.

The opinion advocated by Russian travellers and scholars now is, that success can only be achieved by a process of "russification," or absorptio of the indigenous into the Russian national element; it is this process of absorption, they say, which, continued through ages, has given Russia its numerical greatness. From the eighth to the twelfth century the FinnUgrians - descended from the race of the Rus of Arab geographers-formed the important Slavic empire in the east of

Europe. Later on, its ranks were swelled | represents a type special to itself. Shtshaby the addition of Turko-Tartar elements; and in the future the process of amalgamation will continue uninterruptedly in the north of Asia.

pow observes with justice that "the Siberian-Russian population endeavors, to all appearance, to develop, by way of intermarriage, a distinctive provincial type in The difference between the capability which the characteristics of the original of Russian extension in the south-east and Slavic and Asiatic Russians are by no north-east consists in the circumstance, means equally represented" (Petri 61). that in the former direction the Tshuva- Those circumstances, however, in conseshians, Votyaks, and Tcheremises are, to quence of which the Russio-Uralaltaic is some extent, in a stable social condition, distinguished from the European-Amerihaving for centuries departed from their can amalgam must not be forgotten or nomadic habits and embraced the Chris- neglected. First and foremost, the geotian religion, so that the slight disintegra- graphical relations in the two cases are tion necessary for absorption could not very different, in so far as Russia is and readily be effected; in the north and north- has been in immediate and direct commueast Russia is met by a few, and numeri-nication with Siberia, and is not separated cally small, ethnical fragments only, which are absolutely incapable of resistance and independent national vitality. The west, that is European Russia, will scarcely become the scene of extraordinary ethnical transformation; but in the eastern half, and especially in Siberia, the process of absorption has by no means reached completion.

The present age will accelerate this process and be productive of most remarkable results. The improved communication in the near future by the proposed railway line from the Ural and Turkestan towards Vladivostok, will bring new life, new elements, and new activity into regions hitherto only reached with difficulty; and the native population will be hurried on, with increased swiftness, to their certain doom. For this there is no help and no remedy; and if the present and future influence of our European culture on those regions is to be discussed, the conclusion to which we must arrive will be the following: "The greater portion of northern Asia will be Russian, not only politically, but also ethnically; our civilization will make its entry in the Russian garb, and Russia will long continue to occupy that post of intermediary between western and eastern civilization which it has hitherto occupied."

The same process of amalgamation will take place in northern Asia as has occurred in the case of America by the intermarriage of the invading Europeans with the aborigines, with only this difference, that the characteristics of the mixed race will not be so strongly marked in northern Asia as in South America, where, through climatic and geographical conditions, the native element preponderated, and consequently produced distinct local characteristics. The Siberiak or Siberian Russian of to-day, of course, also

from it by a long sea distance; this position allows assimilation to proceed much more readily and rapidly.

Secondly, the Russians are by origin a mixed race, consisting of Slavic and Uralaltaic elements. The latter is closely allied to the Siberian indigenous tribes, so that the Russian national traits cannot be in very great contrast with the native Siberian elements. The distinguishing characteristics between Russians proper and Siberiacs will therefore chiefly appear in those physical and moral peculiarities that are caused by special climatic territorial and ethical conditions, and which manifest their influence to a greater or less degree wherever men leave their native country, depart from their ancient usages and customs, and enter on a new manner of life.

Perhaps the most interesting question in connection with the cultural and ethical transformation of northern Asia arises with regard to the extent over which this process of absorption will spread, and the limits which are likely to confine Russian advance in the north, east, and south of Asia.

With regard to the north, its arctic nature will long defy all cultural experiments. The icy breath of a nine months' winter chills the most fiery zeal and the fiercest glow of enthusiasm; and the extreme unkindness of climate and soil alike will long render it impossible to enrol races like the Tshuktches, Yukagirs, Samoyeds, and Tunguses among the people of western civilization. The rule of "russification," or Russian cultural influence, will hardly ever extend to the climes inhabited by the Yakuts. The outposts of Russia have remained stationary for nearly two centuries at Yakutsk and other more southern points, without being able to advance farther north; and no one has as yet thought

« ElőzőTovább »