The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1904-03-06

lions in society. They cut US out alike in
the ballroom and the boudoir,' said Rus
sian officer to the writer. THE Russian
soldier is famous as a dancer all over
Europe, but the Ossete beats him. He is
famous. too, for his ability to make himself
pleasant to ladies' but there again. he is
beaten by the Ossete, who was an ignorant
barbarian only a few years ago"
The Ossetes who stay at home in the
Caucasus retain their primitive tribal Gus
toms and pagan religion. Until q few years
ago they practiced deadly family vendettaS
like those of CorsicG-'blood revenge" they
called the custom; but the Russian authori-
ties stamped IL out after infinite trouble,
and tribal crimes are now atoned for by
the payment of cattle to the injured par
ties a cast-iron tariff drawn up by the
Russians.
The queerest custom of the Ossetes is
their fondness for funeral feasts, which
seem to form the buwark of their pagan
creed. In Ossetia a man has to feed not
only his descendants, but also his departed
ancestors. Your dead are hungry!'-that
is the worst insult which can be flung at
the head of an Ossete.
There are no fewer than ten "Feasts of
the Dead during the year. and some of
these feasts last for several days. The
piOuS Ossete does not spread food and drink
before the tomb of the altar of his ances-
tor, like the Chinese. He devours the Of
ferings himself, and by a convenient theo-
logical doctrine they are supposed to nourish
the defunct prOgenitor in whose honor they
are offered An OSSete may thus make
hog and a drunkard of himself, and charge
the offense 10 flial piety, for obviously the
more he can eat and drink the better it is
for the deceased.
The ritual of the Ossete religion. if so
it may be called. is full of references to the
sacred duty of looking after the daily
bread of ones ancestors. The following
New Years prayer to the departed has been
translated by Professor Kovalevsky, a dis
tinguished Russian scholar:
May he be at peace, and may his grave
be undsturbed; may he be famous among
over his sustenance, and that il may reach
him untouched and be his forever, that, in
creasing, it may multiply as long the
rocks fall down our mountains and the
rivers roll over the plains, neither growing
mouldy in summer nor being frozen in
winter; and may he divide it according to
his good will among such of the dead as
have food
MANY WILD TRIBES.
The Ossetes are only one out of dozens
of tribes which inhabt this wild region,
each with it's own language or dialect, it's
own racial characteristics, and its own
customs. There is n greater medley of
races in the Caucasus than there is even
in the Balkans. and just as much racial
rivalry and hatred. Mohammedan, Christ
ian and pagan live side by side, and there
is keener antipathy between the various
sects of Mohammedans and Christians than
eXlStS between those TeUSlOnS themselves.
If Russia were not there to keep the peace
they would fight continually, until they de-
stroyed one another like the famous Kill
kenny cats.
AS il is, there is never so much peace
that il grows monotonous. The officer of a
Russian post seldom passes a fortnight
without having To take the warpath at the
head of "A detachment OF his men Some
times the Ossetes have raided their neigh
bors and lifted cattle after the manner of
Rob Roy and his Highland caterans: some
times the BaZingis-the ''meanest" OF the
tribes-have murdered a Russian official or
a European traveller; sometimes the Kurds
and the Armenians on the frontier have
started massacring one another.
Prince DemidOff, a famous SLAYER of big
game, tells a characteristic story of the
Caucasus. On of his many hunting
trips in that region he stumbled upon a
Cossack post on the Kurdish frontier and
noticed seven graves just outside the lines
Each grave was covered by numerous pairs
of Kurdish boots. The prince asked the
commandant OF the post what il meant
It's just a little warning TO our friends
the Kurds,' the officer replied. They used
TO annoy US very much Ly 'snipng' at our
sentries and numbering any of our men
they happened TO find alone on the country
side.
1t grew so tiresome that at last we