The vicissitudes of the war in the Caucasus of late have been
surprising enough to awaken the interest of Western Europe, even
amidst her own nearer anxieties. Last year it was said that the
conquest of Achulgo, the stronghold of the redoubtable Schamyl,
had effectually broken the power of that daring leader. In direct
contradiction to such reports, later accounts from Daghestan tell
of the reappearance of the notable partisan amidst the lines of the
Russians, and of a defeat of the latter, the most severe, if the
details of the event be true, that they have yet suffered in the
Caucasus. In any case, these exciting changes of fortune would be in
favor of a book professing to describe this interesting region, and
to add to our knowledge of its brave inhabitants. The main interest
of Herr Bodenstedt's work will now be enhanced by its undertaking
to give a more precise account than had previously appeared of the
priest-warrior of Daghestan. and of the new sect as the prophet of
which he succeeded in arraying the independent mountain clans against
their common enemy with a kind of combination unknown in earlier
periods of the struggle.
[Footnote 5: The people of the Caucasus, and their Struggle for
Liberty with the Russians--(_Die Volker des Caucasus, &c._) By
Friedrich Bodenstedt. Second Edition. Frankfurt am Main, Lizius;
London, Nutt.]
The author has evidently lived for some time in the region which he
describes, or in the bordering districts along the Caspian, both in
Georgia and in North Daghestan, His acquaintance with Asiatic and
Russian languages and customs appears to have been gained both by
study and from intercourse with the natives of the south-eastern
frontier. He is not ignorant of Oriental writings that refer to
his subject; and his Russian statistics prove an access to official
authorities which are not to be found in print. These, however
obtained, can scarcely have been imparted to him as one of those
writers whom the Court of St. Petersburg hires to promote its views
through the press of Western Europe. His sympathies are declared
against Russian usurpation; and the tendency of his essay is to prove
how little real progress it has yet made in subduing the Caucasus, the
enormous waste of money and life with which its fluctuating successes
have been bought, and the fallacy of expecting a better result
hereafter.
What it has cost in life on the Russian side to attack-hitherto with
no lasting effect--the handful of Caucasian mountaineers, may be
guessed from a single note, dated 1847: "The present Russian force in
the Caucasus"--including of course, the armed Cossacks of the Kuban
and Terek--"amounts to two hundred thousand." Taking into account the
numbers yearly cut off by disease, more fatal even than the mountain
war, every step of which must be won by the most reckless waste
of life,--the "Russian Officer" may perhaps truly affirm that the
_annual_ expenditure of life by Russia, in her warfare with Schamyl,
has for many years past exceeded the whole number of the population at
any one time directly under the rule of that chieftain.
We have said that the most instructive part of Herr Bodenstedt's essay
is his sketch of that politico-religious scheme which made Schamyl
formidable to the Russians. This system, it is to be observed, arose
and has since been fully developed only in the Eastern Caucasus, where
of late the main stress of the war has been. The western tribes (our
"Circassians") who took the lead at an earlier stage of the contest,
were not then, nor have they since been, inspired by the fanatic zeal
which united the tribes of Daghestan. They fought from a mere love
of independence, each little republic by itself; and their efforts,
however heroic, being without concert, gradually declined before the
vast force of the invader. In the region looking westward from the
Georgian frontier on the Euxine, on the one side of the Caucasian
range, and along the lower Kuban on the other, the Russian posts
are now seldom threatened but by small predatory bands; the natives,
retired to their mountain villages, have for some time made but few
more formidable incursions. The war is transferred to the region
spreading eastward from the Elbrus to the Caspian; where the strife
for free existence is animated not less by the hatred of Russian
slavery than by a fresh outbreak of Mohammedan zeal against infidel
invasion,--a revival, in fact, of that war-like fanaticism which made
the Moslem name terrible from the eighth to the sixteenth century.
It dates from the years 1823-4; at which period a "new doctrine" began
to be preached, secretly at first, to the select Uléma, afterward to
greater numbers, in word and writing, by one Mullah Mohammed, a famous
teacher and a judge (or _kadi_) of Jarach, in the Kurin district of
Daghestan. He professed to have learnt it from Hadis-Ismail, an Alim
of Kurdomir, highly famed for wisdom and sanctity. It laid bare the
degradation into which his countrymen had sunk by irreligion and by
the jealousy of sect; their danger, in consequence, from enemies
of the true faith; and urged the necessity of reform in creed and
practice, in order to regain the invincible character promised by the
Prophet to believers. The theoretical part of the reformed doctrine
seems to be a kind of Sufism,--the general character of which mode
of Islam, long prevalent in the adjacent kingdom of Persia, has
been described by our own orientalists. Disputed questions as to its
origin, whether in Brahmin philosophy or in the reveries of Moslem
mystics, cannot be discussed here; it must suffice to indicate those
points which appear to connect it with the hieratic policy that has
given a new aspect to the war in the Caucasus.
Proceeding nominally on the basis of the Koran, it inculcates or
expounds a kind of spiritual transcendentalism; in which the adept is
raised above the necessity of formal laws, which are only requisite
for those who are not capable of rising to a full intelligence of the
supreme power. To gain this height, by devout contemplation, must be
the personal work and endeavor of each individual. The revelation of
divine truth, once attained, supersedes specific moral injunctions;
ceremonies and systems, even, of religion, become indifferent to the
mind illuminated by the sacred idea. A higher degree is the perfect
conception or ecstatic vision of the Deity;--the highest-reserved
only for the prophetic few--a real immediate union with his essence.
Here, it will be seen, are four steps or stages, each of which has
its sacred manual or appropriate system of teaching. In the hieratic
system, of which Schamyl is the head, the divisions seem to correspond
pretty nearly with this arrangement, as follows:--
The _first_ includes the mass of the armed people; whose zeal it
promotes by strict religious and moral injunctions enjoining purity of
life, exact regard to the ritual of the Koran, teaching pilgrimages,
fasting, ablutions; the duty of implacable war against the Infidel,
the sin of enduring his tyranny.
The _second_ is composed of those, who, in virtue of striving upward
to a higher Divine intelligence, are elevated above ceremonial
religion. Of these the _Murids_ (_seekers_ or _strugglers_,) are
formed: a body of religious warriors attached to the Imam, whose
courage in battle, raised to a kind of frenzy, despises numbers and
laughs at death. To accept quarter, or to fly from the Infidel, is
forbidden to this class.
The _third_ includes the more perfect acolytes, who are presumed to
have risen to the ecstatic view of the Deity. These are the elect,
whom the Imam makes _Naibs_ or vice-regents,--invested with nearly
absolute power in his absence.
The _fourth_, or highest, implying entire union with the Divine
essence, is held by Schamyl alone. In virtue of this elevation and
spiritual endowment, the Imam, as an immediate organ of the Supreme
Will, is himself the source of all law to his followers, unerring,
impeccable; to question or disobey his behests is a sin against
religion, as well as a political crime. It may be seen what advantage
this system must have given to Schamyl in his conflict with the
Russians. The doctrine of the indifference of sects and forms enabled
him to unite the divided followers of Omar and of Ali, in a region
where both abound, and where the schism had formerly been one of
the most effectual instruments of the enemy. The belief in a Divine
mission and spiritual powers sustains his adherents in all reverses;
while it invites to defection from the Russian side those of the
Mohammedan tribes who have submitted to the invader. Among these,
however, Schamyl, like his predecessors in the same priestly office,
by no means confides the progress of his sect to spiritual influences
only. The work of conversion, where exhortation fails, is carried on
remorselessly by fire and sword; and the Imam is as terrible to those
of his countrymen whom fear or interest retains in alliance with
Russia, as to the soldiers of the Czar. With a character in which
extreme daring is allied with coolness, cunning, and military genius,
with a good fortune which has hitherto preserved his life in many
circumstances where escape seemed impossible,--it may be seen that the
belief in his supernatural gifts and privileges, once created, must
always tend to increase in intensity and effect among the imaginative
and credulous Mohammedans of the Caucasus; and that this apt
combination of the warrior with the politician and prophet accounts
for his success in combining against the Russians a force of the once
discordant tribes of Daghestan, possessing more of the character
of a national resistance than had been ever known before in the
Caucasus,--and compelling the invaders to purchase every one of their
few, trifling, and dubious advances by the terrible sacrifice of life
already noticed.
In this formidable movement the highlander's natural freedom is fanned
into a blaze by a religious zeal like that which once led the armies
of Islam over one half of Asia and Europe. Although it reached its
highest energy and a more consummate development under Schamyl, it was
begun by his predecessors. Of the Mullah Mohammed, who first preached
the duty of casting off the yoke of the Giaour, and the necessity of
a religious reform and union of rival sects, as a means to that end,
we have already spoken. This founder of the new system, an aged man,
untrained in arms, never himself drew the sword in the cause; but was
active in diffusing its principles and preparing a warlike rising by
exhortations and letters circulated through all Daghestan. Suspected
of these designs, he was seized, in 1826, by the orders of Jermoloff;
and although be escaped,--by the connivance, it is said, of the native
prince employed to capture him,--he afterward lived, in a kind of
concealment, for some years. The post of Imam was thereupon assumed
by a priest who was able to fight for the new doctrine as well as
to preach it. The first armed outbreak took place under Kasi-Mullah,
about the year 1829; from which time, until his death in a battle at
Himry, in 1831, he waged a terrible, and, although often defeated,
a virtually successful warfare, against the Russians, while he
prosecuted the work of conversion among the tribes of Islam who
delayed to acknowledge his mission, and to join in his enmity to the
Russians, by the extremities of bloodshed and rapine. His death, after
an heroic resistance, was hailed as a triumph by the Russians. They
counted on the extinction of the new sect in the defeat of its leader,
whose dead body they carried about the country to prove the imposture
of his pretensions. This piece of barbarism produced an effect the
reverse of what they expected. The venerable face of the Imam, the
attitude in which he had expired, with one hand pointed as if to
heaven, was more impressive to those who crowded round the body than
his fearless enthusiasm had been,--and thousands who till then had
held aloof, now joined his followers in venerating him as a prophet.
Of this first warrior-priest of Daghestan, Schamyl was the favorite
disciple and the most trusted soldier. Kasi-Mullah was not killed
until Schamyl had already fallen as it seemed, under several deadly
wounds:--his reappearance after this bloody scene was but the first of
many similar escapes, the report of which sounds like a fable. He did
not, however, at once succeed to the dignity of Imam: the office was
usurped for more than a year by Hamsad Beg (Bey), whose rapacious and
savage treatment of some of the princely families of Daghestan nearly
caused a fatal reaction against the new sect, and the destruction
of its main support, the Murids. Hamsad Beg performed no action of
consequence against the Russians; but expended his rage upon the
natives allied with them, or reluctant to obey his mandates. He
was assassinated in 1834, by some kinsmen of a princely house whose
territories he had usurped after a massacre of its princes. In the
affray which took place on this occasion, there perished with him
many of the fanatic Murids, who had become odious as instruments of
the cruelties of their Imam. On his death, Schamyl was raised to
the dignity,--but it was some time before the mischief done by his
predecessor was so far repaired as to allow him to act with energy
as the prophet of the new doctrine. One of the ill effects of Hamsad
Beg's iniquities had been the defection to the Russians of n notable
partisan--Hadjii Murad--for many years a fatal thorn in the side of
the independent party.[6] This and other difficulties, among which was
the unpopularity of the Murids under Hamsad Beg, were removed by new
alliances and precautions, while all that eloquence and skill could
perform was applied to restore the credit of the religious system,
before Schamyl could hazard a direct attack of the Russian enemy,
who meanwhile had taken advantage of the delay and disunion to gain
ground in many parts of Daghestan. From the year 1839, however, the
tide rapidly turned; and the result, from that date until the period
at which the account closes (1845)--when Woronzow was appointed to
command in the Caucasus, with nearly unlimited powers,--has been,
that the Russians, in spite of tremendous sacrifices, were constantly
losing ground and influence, while Schamyl gained both in equal
proportion. The details of the campaigns during this interval are
highly interesting; and we regret that conditions of space forbid
us to translate some of the exciting episodes recorded by Herr
Bodenstedt. We may, however, extract the following account of the
Caucasian hero,--whose portrait, we believe, has never before been so
fully exhibited to European readers;--
[Footnote 6: It is worth noting--as a characteristic of Russian
misrule and of its consequences--that this chieftain, after having
been a devoted soldier of the Emperor for seven years, was goaded by
the ill treatment of his officers into abjuring the service; make the
offer of his sword to Schamyl, against whom he had fought with the
utmost animosity; was heartily welcomed by that prudent leader, and
became one of his principal lieutenants.]
"Schamyl is of middle stature; he has light hair, gray eyes, shaded
by bushy and well-arched eyebrows,--a nose finely moulded, and a small
mouth. His features are distinguished from those of his race by a
peculiar fairness of complexion and delicacy of skin: the elegant form
of his hands and feet is not less remarkable. The apparent stiffness
of his arms, when he walks, is a sign of his stern and impenetrable
character. His address is thoroughly noble and dignified. Of himself
he is completely master; and he exerts a tacit supremacy over all who
approach him. An immovable stony calmness, which never forsakes him,
even in moments of the utmost danger, broods over his countenance.
He passes a sentence of death with the same composure with which
he distributes "the sabre of honor" to his bravest Murids, after a
bloody encounter. With traitors or criminals whom he has resolved to
destroy, he will converse without betraying the least sign of anger or
vengeance. He regards himself as a mere instrument in the hands of a
higher Being; and holds, according to the Sufi doctrine, that all his
thoughts and determinations are immediate inspirations from God. The
flow of his speech is as animating and irresistible as his outward
appearance is awful and commanding. "He shoots flames from his eyes,
and scatters flowers from his lips,"--said Bersek Bey, who sheltered
him for some days after the fall of Achulgo,--when Schamyl dwelt for
some time among the princes of the Djighetes and Ubiches, for the
purpose of inciting the tribes on the Black Sea to rise against the
Russians. Schamyl is now (_circa_ 1847?) fifty years old, but still
full of vigor and strength: it is however said, that he has for some
years past suffered from an obstinate disease of the eyes, which is
constantly growing worse. He fills the intervals of leisure which his
public charges allow him, in reading the Koran, fasting, and prayer.
Of late years he has but seldom, and then only on critical occasions,
taken a personal share in warlike encounters. In spite of his almost
supernatural activity, Schamyl is excessively severe and temperate in
his habits. A few hours of sleep are enough for him: at times he will
watch for the whole night, without Showing the least trace of fatigue
on the following day. He eats little, and water is his only beverage.
According to Mohammedan custom, he keeps several wives--[this
contradicts Wagner, who affirms that Schamyl always confined himself
to one]; in 1844 he had _three_, of which his favorite, _Dur Heremen_,
(Pearl of the Harem) as she was called, was an Armenian, of exquisite
beauty."
Will Russian arms prevail in the end? The following is Herr
Bodenstedt's answer; after noticing the arrival of Woronzow, and the
expectations raised by his talents, by the immense resources at
his command, as well as by such events as the storm of Schamyl's
stronghold of Cargo:--
"He who believes that the issue of this contest hangs on the
destruction of stone fortresses, on the devastation of tracts of
forest, has not yet conceived the essential nature of the war in the
Caucasus. This is not merely a war of men against men--it is a strife
between the mountain and the steppe. The population of the Caucasus
may be changed; the air of liberty wafted from its heights will
ever remain the same. Invigorated by this atmosphere, even Russian
hirelings would grow into men eager for freedom: and among their
descendants a new race of heroes would arise, to point their weapons
against that servile constitution, to extend which their fathers had
once fought, as blind, unquestioning slaves."
To this answer of Herr Bodenstedt's we will add nothing of our own. We
are weary with waiting for the events of history such as we would have
them.
* * * * *