THE CITY OF TIFLIS
The Right Honourable James Bryce, British Ambassador to Washington,
who visited Tiflis thirty-five years ago or more, on his way to climb
Mount Ararat, described that city as “a human melting pot, a city of
contrasts and mixtures, into which elements have been poured from half
Europe and Asia and in which they as yet show no signs of combining.
The most interesting thing about it,” he said, “is the city itself,
the strange mixture of so many races, tongues, religions, customs. Its
character lies in the fact that it has no character, but ever so many
different ones. Here all these people live side by side, buying and
selling and working for hire, yet never coming into any closer union,
remaining indifferent to one another, with neither love nor hate nor
ambition, peaceably obeying a government of strangers who conquered
them without resistance and retains them without effort, and held
together by no bond but its existence. Of national life or numerical
life there is not the first faint glimmer; indeed, the aboriginal
people of the country seem scarcely less strangers in its streets than
do all the other races that tread them.”
There are said to be seventy different languages spoken on the streets
of Tiflis, or at least so many dialects of the various races of Europe
and Asia who have been attracted there by business and other interests
and in search of employment. Many of the dialects belong to the same
parent language; many of the races sprang from the same stock, but
each has acquired a certain individuality by reason of its environment
and the conditions under which it has been living. As Mr. Bryce says:
“Probably nowhere else in all the world can so great a variety of
stocks, languages, and religions be found huddled together in so narrow
an area. All these races live together, not merely within the limits
of the same country, a country politically and physically one, but to
a great extent actually on the same soil, mixed up with and crossing
one another. In one part Georgians, in another Armenians, in a third
Tartars, predominate, but there are large districts where Armenians
and Georgians; or Armenians, Georgians, and Tartars; or Tartars
and Persians; or Persians, Tartars, and Armenians, are so equally
represented in point of numbers that it is difficult to say which
element predominates. This phenomenon is strange to one who knows only
the homogeneous population of west European countries, or of a country
like America, where all sorts of elements are day by day being flung
into their melting pot and lose their identity almost at once.”
What Mr. Bryce wrote thirty-five years ago of Tiflis is equally true
to-day. Perhaps it is even more true than it was then because of the
increase of population. Tiflis is twice as large by the census of 1905
as it was in 1875, when he was here. Tiflis already has two hundred
thousand population, and is growing rapidly. A bird’s-eye view of this
curious old town can be obtained by taking a funicular, or inclined
plane, railway to the top of a bluff, where there are a restaurant, tea
houses, a merry-go-round, and other simple amusements which are much
patronized by the working classes. Standing upon a platform, you can
take in the whole panorama. The different sections of the town can be
pointed out to you--the Russian, German, Georgian, Persian, Armenian,
and Tartar quarters, with the brown river dividing them and the roofs
painted in different colours.
[Illustration: Principal Club at Tiflis]
Wherever you see a group of dark crimson roofs you may know that
they cover Russian soldiers, for that is the colour of their
barracks, selected, a cynical friend remarked, by accident and not by
design--although it is very appropriate to the business upon which the
garrisons are engaged. The Armenians paint their roofs a copper green
or silver gilt, similar to the steeples on their churches, which are
ugly-looking cylinders with tin caps shaped like a cartridge, although
the cross that springs from the top of each sanctifies it. They are
in striking contrast with the Byzantine domes of the orthodox Greek
church. There are two sects, the Russian and the Georgian, who disagree
more from racial than from theological incompatibility. The Greek domes
are of the shape of an inverted turnip and are painted blue, which adds
to the picturesqueness of the scene.
You can see several mosques patronized by the Persian Mohammedans,
but they are shabby, dirty places, without the slightest attractive
feature, and very poor places for any respectable person to pray in.
Judging from their houses of worship, the Persians have not much
respect for their own religion, although they look thoughtful and
earnest and sincere, and pray aloud like the Pharisees of the Bible,
regardless of others, and the sounds from a mosque are often like a
hubbub.
We went into a mosque in the tailors’ quarter one morning and saw
an old Persian priest with whiskers dyed a vivid scarlet. I asked
Naskidoff, our dragoman, why the old man made himself look so
ridiculous, and he explained that it is the fashion--that is all. As
the priest is the only man in Tiflis I had seen so decorated, he must
be introducing the style and is not receiving much encouragement.
There are several other cities in the Caucasus, but none of any
importance, and Tiflis, being the political capital, with a viceroy;
the military headquarters, with a force of 135,000 men; and the centre
of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, there is much beside commercial
business and agriculture to draw the people there. The city is divided
almost equally by the river Kur, a swift, muddy stream about the colour
of strong coffee, which is confined to a narrow cañon, with steep walls
of stone, where it dashes through the town. There is a great waste of
manufacturing power, which might be profitably utilized, but, with
the exception of some curious floating flour mills, I did not see any
mechanical industries.
These flour mills are built of wood, and at first glance look like bath
houses. Each of them has a big water wheel, which turns the stones.
The houses are supported on the water by a sort of catamaran, a wide
float being underneath the mill and a narrow one on the other side of
the power wheel. They are anchored near the banks, and their position
can be shifted according to the will of the owner. Usually each of
them has a little warehouse barge attached, where the raw material and
the finished product are stored, and if you will watch you can see men
going back and forth between the sawmill ship and the shore carrying
bags upon their backs.
At the eastern end of the town is a narrow pass between two rocky
hills, which seems to have been cut by the water. The walls are
precipitous--one hundred feet or more above the river. On one side
the bluff is crowned by a citadel strongly fortified. It commands
the entire city. A few shells from one of the guns could utterly
destroy both the business and the residence sections. Within these
fortifications is a repulsive looking prison, said to be crowded with
political offenders. Strangers are not invited to visit the place, and
they are likely to make themselves unpopular by discussing it.
The Russian section is new and modern, with wide, clean streets, good
sidewalks, an opera house, a theatre, a club, and a military museum
or “Temple of Glory,” as they call it. There trophies won by Russian
arms, battle flags, portraits and relics of military heroes and other
interesting mementoes, have been collected, with several battle
pictures and other representations of war. One of the pictures, painted
on a mammoth canvas, represents the entrance of the Russian army into
Tiflis in 1808, when the king of Georgia asked Alexander I to come down
and protect him against the Persians; another represents a treaty being
negotiated in a forest between a native chief and a Russian general;
but the most interesting of all is a relief map of the Caucasus which
shows you at a glance the extraordinary configuration of this part of
the earth. Bronze tablets inscribed with records of all the battles
fought by the Russian soldiers in the Caucasus from 1567 to 1878 have
been embedded in panels in the outer walls of the museum, which are
of great historical value. They give the number of men engaged and the
casualties.
The principal street of the town is called Golovinski Prospekt, in
imitation of the Nevsky Prospekt of St. Petersburg, and it is a
fashionable promenade.
To the east of this clean Russian town is the Persian quarter, as
genuine as any city of Persia, with narrow, crooked streets and mud
houses of only one or two stories, which were built when the Persians
occupied this country. On both sides of the street are little shops,
like closets, set back into the walls, not more than six or eight feet
square, with no light or ventilation except that which comes through
the door. Each line of business has a street or a covered arcade to
itself. The rug dealers are all in one street, the silversmiths and
goldsmiths in another; the hat makers, the dry-goods dealers, the
hardware men, the butchers, the bakers, and even the bath houses and
the barbers are segregated like the tailors and the dealers in kitchen
utensils, which is a great convenience.
One whole street is given up to barbers, who do a big business, for the
Persians shave their heads instead of their faces. All the bath houses
are on one street, which seems to be well patronized also. Naskidoff,
who knows everything, says the Persians wait until they are very dirty
and then go and take a long, hot bath.
Many of the merchants make their own goods and work at their own trade
in their shops where their customers can see them. The Persians are
petty merchants; the Georgians manufacture arms and are gold and silver
smiths. Their handiwork is rude but artistic; that is, they show more
taste than skill. They run to belts, daggers, revolver handles,
cups, flagons, filigree buttons, and saddle ornaments, which the
Georgians covet more than virtue. They do some very clever work by
inlaying steel with silver and gold, but it is not so fine or so
artistic as the cloisonné of Japan.
[Illustration: Floating Flour Mill, Tiflis]
The Armenians are the big dealers, the bankers, the money lenders,
and, like most prosperous people, are the object of jealousy and
resentment. I was told that when an Armenian loans money he expects to
have it repaid. His business reputation is fine, but the people who owe
him money hate him. All the Armenians are thrifty, industrious, and
temperate, and do not waste their substance in riotous living.
The Tartars, who have their own section of the town, hate the Armenians
more than the Persians do, not only because of a difference of
temperament and habits of life, but because the Tartars and Persians
are Mohammedans and the Armenians are Christians. The Tartars are the
toughest of the lot. They are kindly and loyal but hot-headed, with a
fondness for a fight and strong drink, notwithstanding the prohibition
of the Koran. When a Tartar lets himself go, other people are wise to
give him the right of way, particularly when he wears a knife at his
belt and “totes” a couple of guns. He abominates the Armenians, who are
a constant moral reproach to him, and makes no effort to conceal his
hatred.
Upon the summit of a mighty rock, upon a promontory projecting from
a ridge rising several hundred feet above the river that bathes its
base, is an old citadel built in the twelfth century by Georgian kings
to defend Tiflis against Persian invasion. It is a mighty mass of
brick masonry but was abandoned a hundred years ago. The ruins are
well cared for and the government has made a botanical garden which is
very creditable in the old moat and the approaches that surround the
fortifications.
I noticed a number of American trees tagged in English with the
botanical and the common names and acknowledgments to the Agricultural
Department at Washington, from which they came.
Across the gulch which surrounds the garden is a gloomy old cemetery
filled with Tartar tombs. They spell the name “Tatar” now, and say
that it is the only proper way, but you must admit that it isn’t
so forcible. “Timour the Tartar” could only have been a bold and
belligerent Oriental chieftain, with a dozen wives and a stable of
Arabian chargers with manes and tails like thunderclouds and hoofs shod
with fire. “Timour the Tatar” might just as well have been a cook.
And what would become of the old saying, more familiar to England
than to us, if they adopt the new way of spelling? How would it sound
to say: “Scratch a Russian and you find a Tatar?” They pronounce it
“Tottaar-r-r” in a most savage way, putting all the r’s on the end
instead of leaving one for the first syllable.
The Tartars are as careless and indifferent about money matters as the
Armenians are keen and cunning, and are always in debt to the latter,
which makes hatred, of course. No man loves his creditors. The Tartars,
who are Mohammedans, abominate the Armenians as much as the Kurds do,
first, because they are Christians; second, because they are money
makers, economical, frugal, and thrifty; and, finally, because they
won’t fight. The Tartars care nothing for money nor for property of any
kind, except that they love their horses and their wives and children
alike and are extremely jealous of all three. The family attachment and
devotion of this rough and turbulent race is said to be an example for
all the rest of mankind.
The Tartars have been the terror of Asia for centuries. You have
read, of course, about the invasions of the Tartar hordes from time
to time that have overrun the eastern part of Europe. They are always
fierce, always restless, and do not thrive under the restraints of
civilization. A Tartar will fight his weight in wildcats on any
provocation, but an Armenian is a man of peace.
Not long ago there was an international row here between these two
races, whose settlements adjoin on the east side of the river. I cannot
find out how it began but it was over some trifle that everybody has
forgotten. It waxed more serious daily, and when the Armenians, who
have been butchered mercilessly for ages in Turkey as well as in the
Caucasus, saw the bloodthirsty Tartars sharpening their knives, they
sent a committee to the viceroy to plead for protection. The viceroy,
who is a humane man, understood the situation, but naturally did not
care to butt in for fear of exciting animosity against the government.
Hence he instructed the leaders of both races to appoint committees of
representative men to discuss the troubles with him.
The delegates were selected and came to the palace; they went over the
history of the feud from its primal causes to the present moment, and
then each side submitted arguments. The viceroy, having heard them
through, dodged the issue, and told them that it was not a matter for
the government to meddle with, but one which they must settle among
themselves.
“You are all rational, sensible, business men of intelligence and
experience,” he said, “and it is absurd that you should quarrel over
such trifles as you bring here for me to settle. The government does
not propose to take any part in your controversy; it is too trivial to
waste our time about, and now I simply ask you to sit down together
like sensible men and settle it among yourselves,” and with that he
dismissed the delegation.
The next morning the Armenian committee received a challenge from the
Tartar committee demanding that it select one or two hundred men, or as
many as it pleased, of the best fighting Armenians in Tiflis, to go out
into the country and fight to the death with an equal number of Tartars.
The Armenians returned a scornful reply. They are better at writing
than at fighting. With great dignity and decorum they rebuked the
Tartars for suggesting such a barbarous method of settling a quarrel in
the twentieth century of human civilization.
The Tartars reported that the Armenians were cowards and offered to
give them odds of two to one, but the Armenians refused to discuss the
subject any further, and kept inside their doors as closely as possible
until the excitement died down.
There is no unity among the seventy races of Tiflis, there is no common
national feeling; there is nothing upon which patriotism could be
based. No two of the many races represented here are on amicable terms,
except the Germans, who mind their own business and are friendly to
everybody.
[Illustration: A Georgian Cavalier]
There is no loyalty to the czar and nothing to inspire it. The
administration of the Caucasus is purely military. The first thought
in the Russian mind is conquest. After that there is no other thought
but to retain possession. Instead of planting trees and encouraging
the people to improve their methods of agriculture, the Russians build
fortresses, and instead of building school-houses they build barracks.
The railway across the province and that which runs down to the
Persian border were primarily for the movement of troops, and military
supplies are given preference over all other freight. The famous road
through the Caucasus Mountains is for military purposes rather than for
commerce. At least one hundred and fifty thousand soldiers are kept on
a war footing in this province alone. That number of men are not only
withdrawn from the fields and factories, and the number of producers
thus reduced, but the peasants who work the farms, the shopkeepers and
other peaceful members of the population, are taxed to pay for their
support, which is a continual grievance that cannot be removed. If the
money that is spent upon military purposes could be devoted to material
development and the education of the people the army would not be
needed.
All the influential and lucrative offices are held by imported
Russians, although clerkships and other minor positions are given to
natives. The province of the Caucasus, which is north of the mountain
range, and that of the trans-Caucasus, which is south, are governed by
autocrats who are directly responsible to the czar, and to him alone.
Several members of the imperial family have occupied the posts which
were considered desirable until the revolution.
At the same time, it should be explained that the Russians are there by
invitation. More than a hundred years ago the Georgian king voluntarily
appealed for the protection of Alexander I, against the aggressiveness
of Aga Mohammed Khan, a Persian invader, and in 1801 he signed a treaty
of practical annexation to Russia with Alexander I. There is a fine
large historical picture by a Georgian artist in the military museum
here representing the enthusiasm manifested by the people when the
Russian troops entered the city of Tiflis and the Russian governor
assumed authority.
The political situation here is practically the same as that in
Poland. Georgia is a conquered province. It was added to the Russian
Empire without the consent of the people. They are Russian subjects by
compulsion and they do not like it. Their former king appealed to the
Russians for protection against the Persians more than a century ago;
the Russians responded to the appeal and have “assimilated” the kingdom
of Georgia as they did the kingdom of Poland.
All the big buildings are barracks. The garrison of Tiflis is
thirty-five thousand soldiers, and that does not seem to be sufficient
to keep the people in order. There are soldiers everywhere. Every other
man you meet on the street wears a uniform; almost every guest at
the hotel is a general or a colonel, and every first-class passenger
on the railway trains is an officer of rank. They are a fine-looking
lot of men, and their uniforms are very conspicuous, being of a light
bluish gray, with an abundance of gold braid. A Russian officer is
never out of uniform and never parts from his sword. In the railway
trains, in the restaurants, even at church, he is heavily armed, and
every officer seems to wear his winter overcoat in this hot weather
which is difficult to understand. There may be a regulation requiring
officers to wear overcoats twelve months in the year, regardless of the
temperature, and that is the only way we can explain it.
The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs at St. Petersburg, as a matter
of convenience for the transaction of business, has an annex here,
and a sub-secretary of foreign affairs who deals with Persia, the
emir of Bokhara, and other Asiatic princes under Russian protection.
He receives his instructions from St. Petersburg, but is allowed a
good deal of discretion in dealing with matters of official business.
The present incumbent of that office is a very agreeable gentleman,
Loukainow Stanislavovitchou Kokhanowskiomou, to whom I had a letter
of introduction, but fortunately I was not compelled to pronounce his
name. I could properly address him as “Excellency.” He occupies a
commodious house not far from the viceroy’s palace, comporting with the
dignity and importance of his office, and has a collection of rugs and
Oriental embroideries that a connoisseur would covet.
His Excellency has handled the Persian question with a great deal
of diplomatic skill and keeps the British government in a perpetual
fidget, but the policy of Russia can never be mistaken. The czar
proposes to control Asia, regardless of the opposition of Great Britain
and all whom it may concern. Because of the stupendous folly of her own
agents Russia lost her hold on China and all that she had gained during
the last thirty years in her advance toward the East. All this will
have to be done over again, but the preparations have begun and the
work is under way.
The condition of affairs here may be judged by the manner in which
the mail is carried through the streets between the railway station
and the post-office. There is a military guard on every train, always
occupying the car next to the locomotive, and at every station when the
train stops the soldiers are the first to alight and assume defensive
positions. This is in addition to the local police, who are also in
evidence in every direction. When a train comes into Tiflis the guard
alights and takes a position around the mail and express car, where
it remains until all the passengers have disembarked and gone their
way. Then when the mail car is opened, the bags and express packages
of value are placed in steel safes, which are lifted upon light wagons
drawn by three horses. When the transfer is made the horses start on a
dead run for the post-office, led by a drosky containing two heavily
armed men and entirely surrounded by a squad of Cossacks, the famous
Rough Riders, every one of them with a cocked rifle across the pommel
of his saddle. These precautions are said to be necessary because on
several occasions mail has been held up and destroyed and valuable
express packages have been stolen by gangs of men representing the
social revolutionary party.
The most satisfactory section of Tiflis is called by everybody “the
Colony.” It is a settlement of between four and five thousand Germans
from Wurtemberg, who came to southern Russia early in the nineteenth
century by invitation of Catherine the Great. She gave them lands,
guaranteed them the free exercise of their religious beliefs, and
exemption from military service forever. The latter pledge was violated
during the war between Russia and Turkey in 1877, and since that time
the Germans have been compelled to serve their five years in the
army with all other Russian subjects, although they take no part in
politics and have no social relations with the Russians, but are very
exclusive and tenacious in their adherence to the customs and habits of
the fatherland.
There are fifty thousand Wurtembergers in the Caucasus and they are
pretty well scattered, but always in colonies, this one at Tiflis being
the largest. They left their native country because the government
attempted to compel them to sing from a new hymn book which they did
not consider orthodox, and rather than submit they abandoned the homes
of their fathers and sought new ones in a far country where they could
worship God in their own way.
Catherine II was a great colonizer, and they have been valuable
colonists. They are the best mechanics and the best farmers in the
country. They have minded their own business, maintained their own
schools, built Lutheran churches, accumulated property, sung the dear
old hymns, increased in numbers, and flourished in a phlegmatic sort of
way.
The members of “the Colony,” as it is always called, have never
attempted to proselyte the Russians or other neighbours, but are
fanatical in their Protestantism, which prevents them from marrying
or even mixing with believers in other faiths. They have a wholesome
Protestant contempt for Mohammedans and also for the Armenians. They
regard the former as worse than heathens and the latter as treacherous,
deceitful, and insincere in their professions of the Christian creed.
They speak nothing but German among themselves, although they are
compelled to use Russian in their business transactions. “The Colony”
was originally a distinct town, but when the railway was built into
Tiflis the station was located on the farther edge of the settlement,
and since that time the gap has been filled and the Germans have
become surrounded with Russians, Persians, Armenians, Tartars, and
representatives of the numerous other races which form the population
here. But they have maintained their exclusiveness just the same. They
have their own beer gardens and places of entertainment, as well as
their own church and schools, and they confine their trade to their own
race so far as possible.
The Lutheran church is a large, fine building, and attached to it,
under the direction of Pastor Mayer, is a school for the education of
teachers, missionaries, ministers, and other religious workers for
the many German colonists throughout the Caucasus. Four miles in the
country is a German farming settlement, resembling an agricultural
village in the fatherland, as closely as it is possible here, with big
stables, cattle-yards, and pigstyes, and evidences of German thrift on
every side. Their orchard fruits, their strawberries and garden truck,
are always the first and the best in the market and bring the highest
prices, and they furnish a valuable object lesson for the Russian and
Georgian farmers which, however, is not imitated so closely as it might
be.
[Illustration: Palace of the Viceroy, Tiflis]
The viceroy’s palace is a miniature copy of the winter palace at St.
Petersburg, of the same architectural design and painted the same
terra-cotta colour, although it is not more than one tenth the size.
It stands upon the principal street, with a large garden in the rear,
and across the street are the barracks of the guards, which seem to be
needed. Wooden barriers have been placed upon the sidewalk to prevent
unauthorized persons from approaching near enough to the building
to do any harm, as some of the people down there have a nasty way
of throwing bombs about, and the posts and railing are painted in
stripes like barbers’ poles. The viceroy’s guards wear the Georgian
uniform, with red coats. They are striking-looking fellows, who are
often mistaken for Cossacks, and the sentinels add a touch of colour
to the picture. There is usually a drosky, drawn by a beautiful black
stallion, awaiting orders at the entrance, and the isvostchik, as the
driver is called, is well worth looking at.
Prince Woronzoff Dashoff, the viceroy, has been there many years and
is popular with the people, who regard him as a just and humane man,
but they complain that his authority has been limited to such a degree
that he is practically a figurehead representing the emperor, while the
military commander rules the country. I wouldn’t wonder if there was a
good deal of truth in the complaint, but the Georgians are in a state
of chronic rebellion and martial law prevails throughout the province.
There has been no peace but that of the sword and the torch since the
1905–6 revolution and the granting of a constitution several years ago,
and there will be no peace until the government gives the Georgians a
show by recognizing their racial individuality and permitting them to
use their ancestral language and enjoy a liberal measure of home rule.
The more we saw of both the men and women of Georgia the better we
appreciate the reputation they have among the beauties of the world.
You could not find a finer looking lot of men in any city in the world
than you meet on the streets of Tiflis, and the women have all the
charms they have been credited with, although it is said that they
become fat early in life from indolence and sweetmeats. Perhaps dress
has a good deal to do with setting off the shape and the features of
the men. I have heard that fine feathers make fine birds. No national
costume is more stately or adds more to the stature and the pose of a
wearer. Perhaps the high-stepping heroes of romance and tragedy whom
we were constantly meeting on the sidewalk would not look so well in
an ordinary suit of store clothes, but one can at least give them the
credit of wearing their ancestral garments with stunning effect.
A certain Georgian dandy patronized the Hotel de Londres, where we were
stopping, to excess. It was remarked that so long as he continues to
spend his money so freely there, the bustling little German lady who
keeps the house will never fail to make an annual profit. He is said
to be very rich, and is a prince, of course. The gossips reported that
he had a quarrel with his brother, and as the two were partners he was
spending the money of the firm more freely than was prudent. But that
is neither here nor there. We only asked the privilege of admiring his
clothes and his poses. We were not responsible for his moral behaviour
and would continue to admire him even if his reputation was twice as
bad as it is.
He wore a different coat and a different dagger and a different shako
every day, and they always matched. He had coats of white, blue, red,
gray, brown, and a mixed colour like Irish homespun. The tunic that he
wore under them was always of a colour to make a striking contrast.
When his overcoat was red, it would be white, and when his overcoat
was white, the tunic would be red. He must have had a large armoury of
daggers and pistols, for he seldom wore the same ones, and we liked
those with plain ivory handles the best. He was a moving picture unlike
anything you can see outside of Georgia.
And then we had another prince with a good reputation, one of the best
men in the province, a man of great wealth and eminent respectability,
who was stopping at the hotel with his two little sons. The boys wore
the national dress, like their father, and with the same dignity and
grace. And we must not forget the Paderewski hair, which is quite
fashionable among gentlemen of literary and musical taste. I do not
know how they make it stick out as they do, but I have seen heads that
a bushel basket would not cover. It is fine hair, too, not coarse and
rough and vulgar. You see such bushy heads upon real, live, ordinary
men frequently upon the streets, with the hair bulging out below shakos
of lamb’s-skin like the curls of the Circassian beauty in the sideshow
of a circus.
One would never tire of the fantastic costumes that are to be seen at
every railway station. The men wear tall chimney-pot hats of Persian
lamb-skin, which look very heavy and very hot, and you wonder how they
can endure them in the summer weather. The hats must weigh several
pounds, but if you ask the wearers they will tell you that the weight
is nothing; and that, like the Irishman’s sheepskin coat, the fur keeps
the heat out in summer as it keeps the cold out in winter.
Their long coats of homespun are of varied colours. We are accustomed
to see the Cossacks at Buffalo Bill’s great moral show in dark gray
coats, but the Georgians, whose costume is precisely similar in every
particular, affect bright colours--reds and blues of various shades,
grays, and browns, as well as whites and blacks, according to their
taste, and some of them have their shakos of Persian lamb dyed the same
shade as their coats. Many Georgian gentlemen wear beautiful cloaks of
heavy cloth as thick as a board, with a pile heavier than that of plush
and curled like Astrakhan wool. We were told that this material is
homespun too, and it makes a stunning garment.
Every gentleman wears high top boots outside of his trousers, which are
very loose and hang over his boot tops like the knickerbockers of an
English school-boy. Sometimes the boots are embroidered in colours over
the shin and down the calf of the leg. And every gentleman wears an
arsenal in his girdle, consisting of richly mounted knives and pistols,
which look very formidable, but I am told are seldom used.
A Georgian dandy is a great sight, and you see them everywhere in the
Caucasus. The most perfect costume and the most becoming to their dark
complexions, intensely black hair and beards, and their glowing black
eyes is, I think, a pure white coat and a shako of white lamb’s-wool.
And with that colour the Georgian gentleman usually wears a long
dagger with an ivory handle and an ivory sheath and a revolver mounted
to match; although other people might fancy a gentleman done up in
scarlet, who is also worth looking at.
The costumes of the women are not so fancy as those of the men, and
are mostly head dress and veil. They do not wear bright colours like
their husbands and brothers, but chiefly black. The head dress is
a little skull cap about an inch high made of black velvet, with
the top embroidered in silver or gold braid. It is worn low on the
forehead and over it a square of lace or chiffon hanging down over the
shoulders to the waist, either embroidered or trimmed with edging all
around. There is as much difference in the quality of the veil as there
is in the incomes of the wearers. But it is the principal feature of
the costume, and the effect is studied accordingly. Some of the veils
are of Venetian point, others of Brussels lace, and you often see very
fine examples, but most of them are from the local lacemakers or made
at home.
The hair is dressed in four curls, two hanging down in front of the
ears upon the breast and two down the back. As the glory of a Georgian
woman is her hair, her curls are usually conspicuous and kept with
great neatness. Sometimes they reach below the waist.
The rest of the costume is a jacket, either sleeveless or with slashed
sleeves, a frill of lace or a silk handkerchief embroidered in bright
colours around the neck and crossed upon the breast as a Quakeress
would wear it, and from the waist in front hang two broad ribbons or
strips of silk edged with a different colour, like an apron.
The costume varies as to the quality of the material and the amount
of embroidery according to the means of the wearer. The entire dress
is notable for its refinement. Although we saw few of the dazzling
beauties for which Georgia has always been famous, it is probably
our own fault, or rather our misfortune. The best-looking women in
any country are not in the habit of going to the railway stations or
promenading in the parks. We noticed several ladies with beautiful and
refined faces in the shops, and often passed them driving--sufficient
to justify a confirmation of the stories we have heard about the clear
olive complexions, the regular features, the Egyptian eyes, and the
midnight hair, which are the gifts of the women of the Georgian race.
It’s a joke among the Russians that every Georgian is a nobleman and
that your porter or drosky driver is certain to be a baron or perhaps
a count. It is undoubtedly true that titles were once bestowed with
lavish generosity by the Georgian kings, who paid their debts as
well as rewarded merit by conferring rank promiscuously. A gentleman
remarked the other day, however, that the only title worth taking off
your hat to is that of a prince. Every large land owner is a prince.
I do not know that it is necessary for him to have any given area.
As a rule, a Georgian nobleman looks and dresses the part much more
naturally than Russian or other European dukes and princes.
The national pride is equally amusing--pride of ancestry, pride of
race, pride of costume, pride of children; and, as John G. Saxe
wrote of a similar case, they are proud of their pride. To this
characteristic we are indebted for much pleasure. It induces them to
cling to their national costumes and even to the gilded daggers at
their belts.
A striking illustration of this is found in a Georgian shrine opposite
the Hotel de Londres, at the principal gateway to a pretty little park
in Tiflis. There you can see a mosaic icon, representing a full-length
figure of the Saviour in the most gorgeous variety of the Georgian
costume. He is dressed in a long bowrka, or overcoat, faced or lined
with ermine; under this a scarlet tunic and loose blue trousers, tucked
into high-topped leather boots. He wears a green girdle into which a
revolver and a dagger with beautifully enamelled handles are thrust;
upon His breast are silver kilebi, the cases where cartridges are
usually carried, and on His head is a tall nabadi, or stove-pipe
hat, of black Persian lamb’s-wool--Jesus of Nazareth in the raiment of
a Georgian dandy!
[Illustration: A Georgian Prince]
[Illustration: Patriarch of the Georgian Church, Tiflis]
The peasants seem to approve of it, notwithstanding the incongruity,
and we loved to watch them from our windows, thousands every day, for
the park is much frequented by workingmen at the noon and evening hours
of rest. Every one who passes invariably kneels, crosses himself, and
murmurs a prayer, and many kiss the glass that covers the feet of
this Christ, who is clad according to the peasants’ dream of what the
Redeemer should be.
The Georgian priests are fine looking, and the archbishop, or
patriarch, who presides at Tiflis is as handsome and venerable an
ecclesiastic as can be imagined. Some of the priests make themselves
up to look like the Saviour, wearing their hair long and their beards
trimmed as He is represented to look in the pictures. They are said
to be rather illiterate, however. No educational qualifications are
required for ordination. It is a popular saying that only lazy men go
into the priesthood, but I do not think that all of them are lazy. I
have seen many who look like men of energy and brains and devotion.
Almost every store has three or four signs in different
languages--Russian, Armenian, Georgian, Persian, Tartar, and German
also over in “the Colony,” which makes the sign boards look very odd.
Armenian and Georgian lettering is different from Russian, but each is
quite similar to the other.
The shops are unattractive. There are one or two large department
stores filled with modern goods, but in the bazaars and native shops
there is little worth buying. The native goods are rudely made,
although sometimes of artistic design. Rug shops are innumerable and
some of them in the Persian quarter have a large variety of stock, but
the quality is inferior and prices are high. Friends explained that
we must be patient and wait for the dealers to come down; because a
Persian, like all Orientals, never expects the buyer to pay his first
price; but life is too short to haggle over such bargains, particularly
as we can get better goods of the same kind in the shops of Chicago and
Washington at prices quite as low as are charged here. I doubt if there
is a single thing in Tiflis that any American would want which cannot
be purchased to equal advantage at home. But, as I have said, there is
very little that any American would want. The merchants select their
stock to suit the tastes of their local customers, as everywhere. At a
curio shop we picked up some curious old pieces of silver, but they are
valuable only because they are unique.
There are many fine buildings in Tiflis and several handsome
residences. Some of the Armenian merchants are said to be very rich and
they live in costly houses, which are said to be handsomely furnished,
but the Russian officials have the most attractive homes.