Peter Alexeivitch Kropotkin

“ The winter is cold and dry; snow is so trifling that the horses of the Buriats find their food throughout the winter on the steppes, and in the very middle of the winter wheeled vehicles are used all over the west. To the east of the Yablonovoi ridge the Nertchinsk district feels the influence of the North Pacific monsoon region, and snow falls more thickly, especially in the valleys, but the summer continues to be hot and dry. On the high plateau, even the summer is cold, owing to the altitude and the humidity arising from the marshes, and the soil is frozen to a great depth. ”

“ During the Stone Age the human inhabit ants lived in forests of maple, white beech, and apple trees. But the gradual desiccation of the country resulted in the immigration from the Central Asian plateau of such species as could adapt them selves to the diy climate and soil, in the disappearance of Eurojieaii and Altaic species from all drier parts of the region, in the survival of steppe species, and in the adaptation of many of the existing species to the needs of an arid and extreme climate and a saline soil. ”

“ The remainder of the government is of lowland character, hardly at any point rising above the sea by more than a few hundred feet, but these lowlands vary greatly in their different parts. They assume the character of grassy steppes or prairies in the south, of immense marshes sparsely covered with forest in the north, and of treeless tundras as the shores of the Arctic Ocean are approached. ”

“ The Kars sanjak, which was one of the granaries of Turkey, has lost this reputation; but the crops (chiefly wheat and barley) are now again increasing where the early frosts do not interfere with agriculture. Cotton is raised in the Olty region; and in the valley of the Araxes gardening and the culture of the silkworm are widely diffused; while cattle-rearing is the chief source of income in the highlands, especially with the Kurds, who move their felt tents on the yailas to higher levels as the summer sun burns up the vegetation. ”

“ The chief oasis of the Turcoman desert is the Atok, which extends along the base of the Kopet-dagh, and is now traversed by the Transcaspian railway. The Akhal and the Arakadj oases, collectively called Atok, now have a population of about 42,000 Tekke-Turcomans, who have recently settled there, and live for the most part in miserable clay huts or in felt tents (kibitkas) . They raise wheat, barley, aud lucerne; and the Persians have excellent gardens. Some cotton is also grown, and the culture of the silk worm is beginning to spread. ”

“ Agriculture is carried on to a limited extent by the Buriats and in all Russian settlements; but it prospers only in the valleys of west Transbaikalia, and partly in the Nertchinsk region, while in the steppes of the Argun and Onon even the Russians resort chiefly to cattle-breeding and trade, or to hunting. On the whole, corn has to be imported; summer wheat and summer rye, oats, and barley are the chief crops in the east, winter rye not being sown in con sequence of the want of snow. ”

“ Agriculture is spreading but slowly among them; they still prefer to plunder the stores of bulbs of Lilium Martagon, Pæonia, and Erythronium Dens canis laid up by the steppe mouse (Mus socialis) . The Soyotes, or Soyons, of the Sayan Mountains, who are Finns mixed with Turks, the Uryankhes of north-west Mongolia, who are of Turkish origin but follow Buddhism, and the Karagasses, also of Turkish origin but much like the Kirghizes, and reduced now to a few hundreds, are akin to the above.⁠ (10) The Tartars of the northern slopes of the Altai (nearly 20,000 in number) are of Finnish origin. ”

“ Deep short gorges and valleys indent the steep slopes which are inhabited by Ossetians, Tushes, Pshavs, and Khevsurs in the west, and by the various tribes of the Lesghians in the east. Every available patch is used in these high and stony valleys for the culture of barley, even at heights of 7000 and 8000 feet above the sea; but cattle-breeding is the chief resource of the mountaineers, whose little communities are separated from one another by passes in few cases lower than 10,000 feet. ”

“ The Hindu-Rush, with its snow-clad summits of 18,000 and 20,000 feet, limits the highlands of Turkestan to the south-east. It appears now to be settled that this ridge runs from north-east to south-west, as far at least as the latitude of Cabul, and possibly still farther south ; and the last Russian surveys of the Pamir show that it extends north-east as far as Tash-Kurgan (37 45 N. lat, 75 E. long.) . At the foot of its north-western slope it has the Pamir plateau of Pamir the "Roof of the World," with an area plateau. ”

“ Indeed it is very probable that the great migration of the first centuries of our era resulted from the necessity of abandoning East Turkestan. The climate is severe : a cold winter follows a burning summer. Climate. A few showers slightly moisten the surface in spring ; but the summer and autumn are rainless. The air is continually charged with dust, and often with sand. The vegetation of the interior of East Turkestan is very poor, Flora, being the same as that of the steppes of West Turkestan. ”

“ The followers of Islam, whose common law and religion know only of a temporary possession of the land, which belongs wholly to the Prophet, cannot accept the principles of unlimited property in land which European civilization has borrowed from Roman law ; to do so would put an end to all public irrigation works, and to the system by which water is used according to each family s needs, and so would be fatal to agricul ture. When taking possession of Turkestan, the Russians began to grant deeds establishing property rights over land in accordance with Roman law. ”

“ The lower terrace, occupied in Transbaikalia by the Nertchinsk district, has the character of a steppe, but is also intersected by a number of ranges, all running south west to north-east, and all being plications of Silurian and Devonian rocks, containing silver, lead, and copper, and also auriferous sands. Agriculture can be easily carried on in the broad prairies, the only drawbacks being droughts, and also frosts in the settlements in the higher close valleys of the Nertchinsk or Gazimur Mountains. ”

“ TARTARS (more correctly Tatars, but Tartars is the form generally current) , a name given to nearly three million inhabitants of the Russian empire, chiefly Moslem, and of Turkish origin. The majority—in European Russia—are remnants of the Mongol invasion of the 13th century (see Mongols) , while those who inhabit Siberia are survivals of the once much more numerous Turkish population of the Ural-Altaic region, mixed to some extent with Finnish and Samoyedic stems, as also with Mongols. ”

“ Thus by the beginning of our era the Tarim region had a mixed population of Aryans and Ural-Altaians, some being settled agriculturists and others nomads. There were also several inde- lendent cities, of which Khotan was the most important. One portion of the Aryans emigrated and settled in what is now Wakhan (on the Pamir plateau) , the present language of which seems very old, dating anterior to the separation of the Yedic and Zend languages. In the 1st century the Chinese extended their rule westwards over East Turkestan as far as Kashgar. ”

“ Cotton, rice, maize, millet, and wheat are grown ; and MiddendorfFs 2 remark, that on the edge of the desert we find the best cultivated fields and the richest gardens" is still more appli cable to the oases of East than to those of West Turkestan. But outside the oases desolation reigns. Wind freely modifies the sur face, carrying away the finest particles of the gravelly soil, breaking down the barkfuins as soon as man has destroyed the vegetation which grew on them, and lifting the sand into the air and whirling it along in columns of the most fantastic shapes. ”

“ As for the ancient texts with regard to the Jaxartes and Oxus, it becomes more and more probable that their interpretation, if possible at all, is only so when it is admitted that, since the epoch to which these relate, the outlines of the Caspian Sea and Lake Aral have undergone notable changes, commensurate with those which are supposed to have occurred in the courses of the Central Asian rivers. The desiccation of the Aral-Caspian basin proceeded with such rapidity that the shores of the Caspian could not possibly maintain for some twenty centuries the outlines which they have at present. ”

“ Since the theory of geological cataclysms was abandoned, and that of slow modifications of the crust of the earth accepted, new data have been obtained in the Aral-Caspian region to show that the rate of modi fication after the close of the Glacial period, although still very slow, was faster than had been supposed from the evidence of similar changes now going on in Europe and America. The effects produced by desiccating agencies are beyond all comparison more powerful than those which result from the earthquakes that are so frequent in Turkestan. ”

“ The population (497,760 in 1882) is exceedingly sparse, unless the immense uninhabitable spaces of the plateaus be left out of account. Even on the lower terrace nearly the whole of the region on the left bank of the Shilka is unsuited for agriculture, as also are the Gazimur Mountains, where only a few settlers gain a livelihood in some of the valleys, struggling against an unhealthy climate and the influence of goitre. The Russian population there gathers around the crown mines of the Nertchinsk district, while the steppes are occupied by Buriats. ”

“ The forests themselves grow on marshy ground; but where the trees disappear one sees for hundreds of miles nothing but green flowery carpets, which, when trodden on, treacherously yield under the unwary traveller. ”

“ The Yarkand- Daria has its origin in a high valley between the Kuen- Lun and Karakorum Mountains, at the base of Dapsang, from several streams, such as the auriferous Zerafshan, which is fed by the glaciers of the Karakorum pass ; after piercing the Kuen-Lun, it enters the plain, where its waters are soon diverted to the fields and gardens of the Yarkand oasis. The Khotan-Daria rises farther east in the same valley, and also pierces the Kuen-Lun, its two branches the Kara-kash and Urung-kash being renowned for their " black " and " white " jade. ”

“ A succession of villages, supported partly by agriculture and partly by hunting and trade with Mongolia, are settled along the Shilka between Tchita and Sryetensk, while farther down the river flows in such a wild mountain region that only a few families are settled, at distances some 20 miles apart, to maintain communication. ”

“ Every kind of manufactured ware has to be imported from Russia; and even petty trades are almost unknown in the villages.
The trade of the province is chiefly represented by that of Kiakhta. The Cossacks on the frontier carry on some trade in brick-tea, cattle, and hides with Mongolia. The export of furs is of considerable value.
The communications of Transbaikalia are limited to the great Amur highway, which fringes the south coast of Lake Baikal and passes through Verkhneudinsk, Tchita,and Nertchinsk to Sryetensk, whence steamers ply down to the mouth of the Amur ”

“ The dryness of the climate is excessive : rain falls only where the hills cause the clouds to condense, the soil elsewhere being moistened only occasionally by a few showers. Two rivers only the Syr and the Amu succeed in crossing the desert and reaching the Sea of Aral. But their former tributaries no longer run their full course : the glacier-fed Zerafshan dries up amidst the gardens of Bokhara soon after emerging from the highlands ”

“ The steppes which cover the bottom of the valley are for the most part too dry to be cultivated without irrigation. It is only nearer the hillfoots in Kahetia, where multitudinous streams supply the fields and the gardens of the plateau of the Atazan, that wheat, millet, and maize are grown, and orchards, vineyards, and mulberrytree plantations are possible. ”

“ The barbar ous tortures and executions which rendered Khiva notorious in the East are no longer heard of; and the continual appeals of the khojas for "holy" war against their rivals find no response. But the Russian rule has imposed many new taxes, in return for which Turkestan only gets troops of Russian merchants and officials, who, instead of becoming the exponents of what is best in European civilization, too often accept the worst features of the depraved Mussulman civilization of the higher classes of the country. ”

“ Agriculture is the prevailing occupation. It is most productive on the elevated plains of Tomsk, Mariinsk, Barnaul, Kuznetsk, and Biysk. Cattle-breeding is much developed, especially in the Kutundinsk steppe; and bee-keeping is an important source of wealth. Fishing and hunting are extensively carried on in the forest region. Mining occupies several thousands of men in the Altai. ”

“ Although recent immigrants, the Russians already constitute 94 per cent, of the aggregate population, and their numbers are steadily increasing by immigration, and partly also by the arrival of exiles. No fewer than 43,750 immigrants from Russia settled at Tobolsk between 1846 and 1878, but of late this figure has greatly increased. In 1879 as many as 59,134 exiles were on the registers, but of these more than 20,000 had left their abodes and disappeared. As a rule the exiles belong to the poorest class of population. ”

“ There are abundant deposits of gypsum, alum, kaolin, marble, and similar materials. Notwith standing the salt springs of Ferghana and Syr-Daria, the salt lakes of the region, and the rock-salt strata of the Alexaudrovsk Mountains, salt is imported. Turkestan has no manufacturing industry carried on by means Industry of machinery, except a few distilleries and two establishments for and dressing raw cotton. But there is a great variety of artisan work, trade, which, however, has been for some time declining and now stands at a rather low level. 8 Trade is very actively carried on. ”

“ The loess terrace, called "Atok" ("mountain base") , is but narrow, ranging in width from 10 to 20 miles; still its chain of settlements have rendered it possible to lay down a railway which now connects the Caspian with Sarakhs. It is very fertile, but could produce nothing without irrigation, and the streams flowing from the Kopet-dagh are few and meagre. The winds which reach the northern slope of the mountains have been deprived of all their moisture in crossing the Kara-kum the Black Sands of the Turcoman desert ”

“ On our best maps the Trans- Atai Mountains are figured as an isolated range, some 120 miles in length; and it cannot yet be affirmed with certainty which chains of the Tian-Shan, possessing the same border-ridge characters, ought to be considered as its continuations. Further research is needed to determine whether it is continued south-west by the Darvaz, or Lahor, Mountains, where the group of lofty Sel-tau peaks feed the extensive Fedtchenko glacier, or by the Hoja-Mahomet chain on the left bank of the Amu-Daria. 1 Thus the real north-western limits of the Pamir are still unsettled. ”

“ The mineral wealth of Turkestan is considerable. Traces of Minerals auriferous sands have been discovered at many places, but the per centage of gold is too poor to make the working remunerative. Silver, lead, and iron ores occur at several places ; but the want of fuel is an obstacle to their exploitation. The vast coal-beds of Kulja and several inferior ones in Turkestan are not yet seriously worked, the total yearly output being only some 120,000 cwts. The naphtha wells of Ferghana and the layers of graphite about Sairani-Nor are also neglected. ”