Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-03-05

New Year prayer to the departed has been
translated by Prof. Kovalevsky. a distin-
guished Russian scholar:
May he be al peace, and may his grave
be undisturbed;s may he be famous among
the dead, SO that none may have power
over his sustenance, and that 1t may reach
him untouched and be his forever, that, in
creasing, it may multiply long as the
rocks fall down our mountains and the
rivers roll over the plains, neither growing
moldy in summer nor being frozen in win
ter, and may he divide 1t according to his
good will among such of the dead as have
no food"
The Ossetes are only one out of dozens
of tribes which inhabit this wild region,
each with it's own language OF dialect, it's
own racial characteristics and it's own Gus
toms. There is a greater medley of races
in the Caucasus than there is even in the
Balkans, and just as much racial rivalry
and hatred. Mohammedan, Christian and
pagan live side by side, and there is keener
antipathy between the various sects OF MO-
hammedans and Christians than exists be-
tween those religions themselves. IL RuS-
STA were not there to keep the peace, they
would fight continually, until they de-
stroyed one another, like the famous Kill
kenny cats.
AS it is, there is never so much peace
that it grows monotonouS. The officer of
Russian post seldom passes fortnight
without having to take the war path 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-haye murdered a Russian official or
a European traveller; sometimes the kurds
and the Armenians on the frontier have
started massacring one another.
Ten for One.
Prince Demidoff, a famous slayer of big
game, tells 4 characteristic story of the
Caucasus On one of his many hunting
trips in that region he stumbled upon
Ccssacl< 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
commandment of the post what it meant.
Its just a little warning to our friends,
the Kurds,'' that officer replied They
used to annoy us very much by shipping
at our sentries and numbering any or our
men they happened to find alone on the
countryside.
1T grew so tiresome that at last we de-
termined to kill ten Kurds for every COS
sack slain, and put their boots on the grave
of our man pour encourager les autreS.
After two months they gave 1t up, and now
they are as quiet as lambs. In that time
they killed seven Cossacks. Those are their
graves, and if you count the pairs of shoes
you will find seventy
Brigandage is sometimes winked at by the
Russians when it does not trouble them or
other Europeans, and 1t does not seem adj
visable at the moment to suppress 1t at the
cost of campaign with a warlke tribe.
But when they take it into their heads
to hunt gang of brigands down, they
hang remorselessly to the trail until every
one of the bandits is shot or placed in jail.
The remotest caves in the mountains are
vain refugees.
II once saw a pathetic sight when I was
travelling in the Caucasus" said an En-
glishnan known to the writer. Il was visit
ing the prison at Vladuikaukaz and saw a
woman who had come with her baby to
see her husband a captive brigand.
when her turn came she set down the