that the taking up of arms against the infidels was the best fulfilment
of the law of the scharyat, as for example in Chunsach, the principal
aoul of Avaria, where, owing to strong Russian influence, the view
prevailed that it was not expedient to run the risk of losing what of
liberty was left by vainly attempting to regain that which had been
lost. Accordingly Pachu Biké, who here bore rule under the title of
Khaness, prayed Khasi-Mollah not to enter the Avarian territory; but he
persisting, she called together her warriors to resist him. They,
however, fearing at first to face the determined band of murids, she
seized a sword and cried out, "Go home, ye men of Chunsach, and gird on
your wives the swords ye are unworthy to bear yourselves!" Thereupon the
warriors, stung with shame, followed the amazon who immediately put
herself at their head and drove back Khasi-Mollah, though supported by a
force of eight thousand men.
[Footnote A: Plural of alim.]
This repulse turned the hearts of many of the recently converted away
from the new prophet; so that when in the summer of 1830, General Von
Rosen, who had taken the command of the army after the brief and
inefficient career in the Caucasus of Paskievitch, the successor of
Jermoloff, marched on Himri to crush the germ of war which was preparing
to unfold itself in this part of the mountains, the chief men of the
neighboring aouls hastened in great numbers to give in their adhesion to
the supremacy of the Russians. So general in fact was the appearance of
submission that Von Rosen, staying his advance, let Himri go unpunished.
"The enemy are smitten by Allah with blindness!" exclaimed Khasi-Mollah
as he heard that the Russians were retracing their footsteps without
penetrating further into the mountains. "They could not see their
advantage. As is written in the book of the prophet, 'With blindness
will I smite them!'"
This interpretation of the turning back of Von Rosen, struck the heated
imaginations of the mountaineers with such force that they all regarded
it as a miraculous interposition of Allah in behalf of the new prophet;
and when Khasi-Mollah, taking advantage of this sudden turn of men's
minds towards him, defeated a detachment sent under Prince Bekovitsch to
disperse a gathering of murids in the woods of Tchunkeskan, his fame
increased in the land, and a large number of warriors flocked around his
standard.
The next year, therefore, he was enabled to perform the great feat of
capturing Tarku, an important place on the Caspian, and of laying siege
to the fortress of Burnaja which overlooks it. The reinforcements of the
enemy compelled him indeed to retire; but not until after several days
of desperate fighting, and when he had literally strewn the streets of
Tarku with his dead. Then devastating the unfriendly aouls on the Sulak,
beating General Emanuel in a pitched battle, converting by fire and
sword the district of Tabasseran which had held with the Russians,
blockading the strong town of Derbend until it was relieved by superior
numbers, and storming Kisliar on the Terek whence he carried away
captives and much treasure, he terminated the conquests of the season by
captivating the heart of a daughter of Mahomet-Mollah, whom he took to
wife, and then retired into winter quarters in Himri.
Shortly before he had issued the following call, written in Arabic, to
the tribes of Daghestan:--
"Hear all ye men of Daghestan! Our next breaking into the territory of
the unfriendly tribes will be like the rising red of the morning. Blood
will mark our track; fire and desolation will be left behind us; and
what words cannot describe shall be executed in deeds. But accept the
new doctrine and your lives shall be spared, and your property left in
your possession. The song of the nightingale in the spring will be the
sign of our coming. So soon as the snow melts on the mountains, and the
new year puts on its green, we shall sweep over the hostile aouls,
taking by force what is denied to forbearance. We are the terror of the
unbelieving, but the strength and refuge of the faithful; and he who
follows us shall have peace and eternal life. Amen."
But in Himri was destined to terminate the brief career of glory run by
Khasi-Mollah. With the first singing of birds he did indeed go forth,
carrying devastation beyond the Russian lines, even from Kisliar to
Wladikaukas, from the Caspian to the central Caucasus; but the Russian
commander-in-chief, accompanied by General Williaminoff, Prince Dadian,
and the valiant Austrian Kluke Von Klugenau, forced the prophet to
retire and take refuge behind the triple walls of Himri. Thereupon,
during the retreat, the warriors who had been compelled to join his
standard contrary to their inclination, gradually fell off; one by one
the chieftains deserted him as they saw the superiority of the forces of
the enemy; even the principal murid, Hamsad Bey, deceived, it is said,
by forged proclamations issued in the name of the prophet, separated
himself from a leader whose fortunes were so evidently on the wane; and
when October's unfallen leaves were still covering the hills of Himri,
the Russian bayonets arrived to add their gleam to the gorgeousness of
the autumnal decay of nature.
There was now no escape for the faithful few who still adhered to the
cause of Khasi-Mollah, among whom was Schamyl. The artillery under the
direction of General Williaminoff soon brought down the towers of loose
stones over the devoted heads of the murids in Himri. But they met their
fate chanting verses from the Koran. No man had a thought of surrender,
though the paths into the mountains were all in the possession of the
enemy. From street to street and from house to house fought the men of
Himri. Their granite rocks were as red with blood as the leaves of the
trees with the glory of the autumn. Khasi-Mollah, though from his
priestly character he did not himself bear arms, fell surrounded by the
dead bodies of sixty of his disciples. Schamyl also lay at his feet
bored through by two balls, and was left there by the enemy for dead.
When the Russians found the corpse of Khasi-Mollah, the right hand still
pointed to heaven, the left grasped the beard, and over the face was
spread the placid expression of a dream instead of the last agony.
Khasi-Mollah was of a short stature, with small eyes, a thin, long
beard, and a countenance somewhat marked by smallpox.
XXVII.
HAMSAD BEY.
The manner of Schamyl's escape and recovery from the wounds received at
Himri never having been explained by himself, was believed by the
mountaineers to have been miraculous. Certain it is he survived to
receive the mantle of the heroic Khasi-Mollah, though in descending to
him it rested for a short time on the shoulders of Hamsad Bey.
This leader possessed neither the fanatical zeal of his predecessor nor
the military genius of the still greater prophet who came after him; but
being consecrated by Mahomet-Mollah as the successor of Khasi-Mollah,
notwithstanding his separation from the latter previously to the fight
at Himri, he was universally acknowledged as the chief of the new party.
The first of the two years of his rule was spent by him in making
preparations for taking the field, during which time he had the address
to gather together a considerable number of Russian deserters whom he
formed into a separate corps commanded by their own officers, and in
whom, being attached to him by good treatment, he placed such entire
confidence that he even made them his bodyguard. This was something new
in the annals of Circassian warfare; but it was an innovation of short
duration and very questionable utility, inasmuch as such a perfect
machine as the Russian soldier could work to little advantage by the
side of the Circassian warrior with his impetuous impulses and action
independent of the word of command.
The only feat of arms attempted during this year by Hamsad Bey was a
successful attack on the aoul of Chergow, in the Mechtulinian district;
but the spring following he concentrated his forces, amounting to some
twelve thousand men, in the aoul of Gotsatl, in Avaria, eighteen wersts
east of Chunsach, for the purpose of striking a blow at Russian
ascendency in the neighboring districts of Daghestan. But to do this
effectually it was necessary first to put an end to the influence of the
enemy in Avaria itself, and to substitute his own spiritual authority as
murschid in place of the deference paid there to the hereditary khans.
Accordingly Hamsad Bey marched on Chunsach, where Pachu Biké with her
three sons held for the Muscovites. Pitching his tent before this
populous aoul, he sent in his herald to the khaness requiring her to
adopt the new religion of hatred against the Russians, and to join her
forces with his to drive them out of the country. Pachu Biké, who had so
heroically taken up arms against Khasi-Mollah, now thought it more
prudent to try the fortune of negotiation, and for that purpose sent her
two eldest sons, Omar Khan and Abu-Nunzal, to treat with the murschid.
But the latter having got the princes in his possession, caused them to
be put to death; then followed up his treachery by seizing upon the
unresisting aoul; and having decapitated the khaness herself, destroyed
all of the reigning race save her youngest son Bulatsch Khan, a lad
eleven years of age, who was then not present in Chunsach.
The submission of all Avaria, together with several adjacent districts,
followed these acts of barbarous severity on the part of Hamsad Bey; but
the avenger of blood followed close behind him. Two brothers, Osman and
Hadji-Murad, being foster-brothers of Omar Khan, resolved to satisfy the
law which requires in Circassia, as formerly in Judea, that whosoever
sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed. They were at the
time murids of Hamsad Bey, but being urged on by their father, a man
venerable in years, and opposed to the reformed party in religion, they
were induced to set their allegiance to the law of vengeance before
their loyalty to their chief, and accordingly conspired to take him off.
Forty of their relations and friends joined the conspiracy, all taking
an oath on the Koran to be faithful to each other, and never to rest
until they had slain Hamsad Bey. But one among them proved to be a
traitor. Going straightway to the murschid he revealed the plot of the
two brothers. But the Bey, confiding in the loyalty of disciples who had
given him so many proofs of fidelity, would not listen to the tale, and
peacefully resumed the sleep from which he had been awakened to hear it.
On the morrow he fell dead in the mosque of Chunsach, pierced by the
pistol balls of the two murids. One of them, Osman, instantly received
the reward of his treachery in the loss of his life at the hands of the
attendants of the prophet; but the other, Hadji-Murad, escaping in the
confusion of the moment, brought the crowd outside to his assistance by
raising the cry of, "Down with the murids." With sabre and pistol they
rushed into the house of Allah, and in a moment all its stones were red
with the blood of his children. Only thirty out of the one hundred
murids of Hamsad Bey escaped from the mosque with their lives. These
flying before the excited multitude sought refuge in the neighboring
tower; but this being built of wood was set on fire by the order of
Hadji-Murad. Then of the thirty, some precipitated themselves headlong
from the top of the tower; others fell fighting; Mahomet-Hadshi-Jaf, the
same who had betrayed the conspirators, being sorely wounded was taken
captive; only one escaped, as if by miracle--it was Schamyl.
XXVIII.
CIRCASSIAN MODE OF WARFARE.
Such were the leaders under whom Schamyl served his apprenticeship in
the art of war. But from his youth up he had also been trained for the
great military part he was to play in life by engaging in those raids
and forays by means of which the Circassians were wont at that period to
harass and keep at bay the enemy. For while from lack of unanimity among
the tribes, from want of a hero like Schamyl to lead them, from the
superiority of the Russian forces, or from whatever other cause, the
mountaineers were engaged in no great, combined movements of
self-defence, there was notwithstanding constantly kept up, by most of
the tribes of both the eastern and the western Caucasus, the running
fire of the guerilla, and the predatory expeditions of a war of the
border.
Such expeditions were set on foot either by some chieftain who rode from
aoul to aoul calling upon the brave to follow him; or by a summons sent
abroad to the warriors of a certain district inviting them to assemble
in the council ring at a given time and place for the purpose of
agreeing upon an attack upon some fort, or a foray within the lines of
the enemy. The spot selected for holding the assembly would be some
convenient hill-top or vale shaded by trees. There, with no little rude
eloquence, accompanied by the singing the praises of heroes, the subject
of the proposed expedition would be considered, and the course to be
pursued be determined by a majority of voices. With scarcely the
formality of an election, the general preference would select some
chieftain to head the incursion, if finally agreed upon. And to set off
if the occasion pressed, would hardly require more preparation than the
springing into their saddles; for at the bows of these could quickly be
hung a sufficiency of provisions for their simple wants, while
ammunition and arms are always worn about their person.
The Circassian spares his horse when he can, and generally rides slowly
to the scene of contest. Indeed, the route admits of no hurrying; for it
often leads along precipices which would turn almost any head but his
own; winds a narrow, rugged path over the mountains; picks its way along
the rocky bed of the torrent; dives into forests tangled with vines and
brambles; and cannot always turn aside even from the bog and the
quagmire. But his hardy steed never tires; and up hill or down dale
toils patiently, bravely, cheerfully, as if conscious that he was going
on to meet the armed men, and smelling afar off the future battle, the
thunder of the captains, and the shouting. Sometimes the party travels
through the night, each warrior being muffled in a shaggy capote or
bourka, which covers not only the rider but the entire back of his
steed. Above protrude the barrels of the rifles, while below dangle the
horse-tails, making, by their constantly dangling to and fro, the
night-march a very promenade of hobgoblins.
But on the longer expeditions the war party halts at night. Some green
spot having been selected where there is pasturage and water, the horses
are tethered, or allowed to graze under care of persons appointed to
watch them. Their saddles furnish a pillow at night, and their cloth a
carpet to sit upon. Each person contributes from the leathern bottles
and bags at his saddle-bow a portion towards the general mess, which is
prepared by a certain number of the party in turn; and while it is being
made ready, the others having said their evening prayers and performed
their ablutions resign themselves to the soothing influences of the
chibouque, if not prohibited, and to the cordial of coffee, if they have
any. The supper at the very best will consist of hot millet or barley
cakes, and the savory pilaff of minced mutton and millet or rice. A
little honey will be sure to be added, and possibly dried fruits. This,
however, is on the supposition that there are a few sumpter horses
loaded with provisions, as is generally the case when the party is a
large one. There may also have been more or less game picked up by the
way. A bowl of mead or _skhone_ is generally to be had by the
Circassian, let the supper it accompanies be never so scanty; and the
sharp appetite which heaven sends to those journeying through the hills
in the saddle, will season even a little sour milk and a few cakes of
millet and honey, if there be nothing else, with more than the savor of
a feast. The chieftain fares no better than his clansmen; all share in
the mess alike.
The supper finished, and every man having carefully cleansed his
weapons, loaded and primed his guns and pistols, placed his sabre by his
saddle-pillow, while his faithful poniard guards the side it never
leaves, and finally a short prayer for protection having been offered to
Allah, the sentinels also being duly set, the warrior who is to fall in
battle on the morrow lies down to sleep as peaceful as that of the babe
he has left behind in the aoul, and soft as if the canopy overhead were
not the star-spangled curtain of the skies. If the party have tents, as
is sometimes the case, they are pitched by cutting down branches of
trees for lack of poles, and then covering them with the mats and felts
which have been transported in bales on horseback. These simple
structures serve sufficiently well to keep out wind and rain; while the
boughs of many kinds of trees furnish a couch both elastic and fragrant.
Watch fires, too, are often kept burning through the night; and in cold
weather they serve likewise to keep warm those sleeping around them.
When the fires are numerous they light up with picturesque effect the
grim-faced rocks and the solemn woods. A whole mountain side even may be
illuminated by the multitude of flames, making the granite, porphyry,
and limestone glow with colors more gorgeous than those borrowed from
the light of day. Or the gloom of the deep glen is dissipated and
devoured by the lambent tongues of fire, while the rocks over against
each other burn with the additional radiance reflected from their faces.
Beacon answers to beacon from cliffs and hilltops. Perhaps the enemy's
fires far off diffuse a glow through another quarter of the heavens. The
reeds of the Kuban and the Terek set on fire by the Russians to destroy
the ambuscades of the mountaineers, touch with a dull red tint the low
northern horizon; here and there conflagrations raging in the
grass-grown steppes show at night where lie the vast and dreary confines
of the Muscovite; while perhaps the moon sinking below the Black
mountains draws, with a line of silver, the broken outline of their
ridges, leaving in the blackness of midnight the vast forests and
outcropping rocks below.
When the first faint blush of breaking day suffuses the eastern sky far
off above the Caspian, the warrior's eye already open is straining to
catch it. His tent is struck; his horse saddled; his arms girded on; and
he ready for the march. As the gray dawn deepening to crimson fills the
mountains ere the sun be risen with its increasing, all-pervading light,
the horsemen descend in small parties from the already purple heights
into the mists which hang their thin veils over the depths of the
valleys. Their arms reflect the beams of the risen sun, and the red or
purple in their caps is heightened by the glow of the mountain tops.
Gaily they gallop down the easy declivities, their horses snuffing
eagerly the fresh air of the morning, but their ragged banners too wet
with the dews of night to flaunt upon the zephyrs that, newly risen,
scarcely move their wings. The foremost riders, gaining the open valley
screened by an intervening mountain from the plain of the enemy, prance
over it, and companies of horse coming in from different directions join
the general rendezvous until, all counted, they may amount to two or
three hundred, or as many thousand men. For seldom does a Circassian
chief lead on a raid into the enemy's country with either less than the
former number or more than the latter.
The guides now come in from reconnoitring the posture of affairs on the
steppe on the other side of the mountain. In accordance with their
advice most probably had the expedition been originally agreed upon; for
they had represented the enemy's flocks and herds as left unguarded save
by the shepherds, the villages undefended except by the boors, and the
posture of things generally to be such as to promise a certain victory
with booty and captives. Now they come in, having taken a final survey
from some wooded nook on the hill-side of the boundless steppean
prospect, as from his cottage on the cliff the fisherman looks out upon
the level waste of the ocean. The Terek is reported sufficiently low to
be forded; for the stream which in the higher mountains pours down with
headlong fury its waters, transparent save where the white and red
crystals which form its bed are concealed by the foam, creeps through
the steppe a sluggish, muddy current, passable with safety at certain
points and certain stages of the water. In the plain beyond stands a
Cossack village or stanitza, together with a small fort or krepost
surrounded by mud walls, armed with a piece or two of artillery, and
garrisoned by a small body of infantry. It is one of the chain of
similar Cossack settlements which, called "the line" of the Caucasus,
stretches from the mouth of the Kuban to that of the Terek; and as the
invaders penetrate further and further into the mountains, they carry
this system of Cossack colonies and fort defenses with them, so that the
chain forged to bind within its thousand links the liberties of all the
tribes is gradually drawn tighter and tighter.
Over against the ford, and at no great distance from it, stands a
Cossack guard-post. It is constructed of four poles twenty or more feet
in height, which below are fastened in the earth and support on the
upper extremity a seat or lookout. To this the Cossack climbs by means
of a ladder, and there he sits by day and by night watching the forest
of reeds on the river banks, watching the level sweep of the steppe on
either side, watching the opposite hills and mountains. Forlorn indeed
would be the poor Cossack notwithstanding he has before his eyes the
glory of the Circassian hills and the distant snow-summits mingling with
the clouds, were it not for the bottle of schnapps by his side, and the
stroking of his long moustache. For weeks and months he may watch
without seeing a single Circassian. But when he does, he instantly
kindles his beacon fire, and descending seizes his lance left leaning
against one of the four posts, and springing upon his horse which stands
fastened to another, gallops to the stanitza. In all haste the women and
children fly to the fort; the soldiers drive in the swine or cattle
which feed on the grass around it; the sentinels fire the cannon to give
the alarm to the neighboring stanitzas; and every Cossack within sound
of the signal-firing, vaulting into the saddle and putting his steed to
his mettle, hastens lance in hand to drive back the enemy.
But ere he arrives, though fleet be his steed, very likely the
Circassian band, having previously succeeded in reaching the river
unobserved, have swept like a tempest over both fort and stanitza. An
oath of fidelity which even more than any divinity awes the Circassian
mind and rules it, having previously been administered on a pocket
edition of the Koran to each warrior by his chief, and each one before
sallying from his place of concealment in reeds, woods, or hills, having
dismounted to put up with raised hands in silence a brief prayer to
Allah, as well as to tighten his saddle-girths, at a given signal all
spring forward like the roused lion out of his lair. Giving their horses
the rein they have no need of spurs. In a moment they are across the
open space which lies between their cover and the fortress, though some
may have fallen from the enemy's well-aimed guns and musketry. They are
at the gates; they leap the ditch; they climb the wall; they spring down
into the enclosure; at the same time raising a war-cry which resembling
the shrill, melancholy, and fearfully wild howl of the jackal, fills
with unnatural, and even insane consternation the troops who for the
first time hear it. It is now quick work, and the struggle fearful. But
the agile and light-limbed mountaineers are more than a match for the
heavy, slow-wilted Russians; and though in cold blood the former do not
take the life of an enemy, now fury-driven they are swift to smite and
never spare; while above the clash of sabres and bayonets, above the
shouting and the musketry, rises the voice of the Circassian chief who
leads on and deals out destruction until the last Muscovite bites the
dust.