The Sun. — 1841-03-08 (London, England)

JUSTICE OF THE TARTARS OF TILE CAUC,:SUS.-PUNISHMENT OF A RUSSIAN OFFICER AND OF FIVE SOLDIERS  BY BRING IMPALED ALIVE. TIFLIS (GEORGIA), DEC. 4. Amongst the warlike tribes that inhabit the mountains of CaUcasus, one of the most numerous and formidable, perhaps, is that of the Avarians. The Avarians, like the Tchetchenetr, the Lesghis, the Abases. and other CireAssian mountaineers, wage a continual war against the Russians, and consider the booty they may plunder, and the prisoners they make, as their source of riches, and they usually sell the latter to the Kurde, the Armenians, or the Persians. A particular custom amongst the Avarians, who, as well as other warlike tribes, share the prisoners between them after every contest or fortunate expedition, is the following:— The prisoners, being brought together on the same spot, remained exposed for seven suns, in order that all the memLers of till tribe may examine and question them as they think proper. On the eigth day a tribunal, composed of six old men, selected from the most celebrated and v.:ncrated cf the tube—to which is added the Khan, who presides—is convened, in order to hear all the charges that may be made against any of the prisoner!. The verdicts pronounced by this dreadful tribunal are immedia ely put in force.  One of those savage assizes, the details of which we gather from a Russian journal, recently took place in the forest Boujnaki, not far from Tiflis, a central point of the Government of Georgia. On the 10th June oil ast year a murderous engagement, almost a battle, took place between the Russian troops commanded by Generals Test, Grabbe, and Syzojef, and the Circassian tribes united under the command of Scbammil, Khan of the Tchttchcnets, who is now looked upon as the supreme chief of the federation of all the tribes of the mountaineers.  The battle, which took place in the plain of Dagbcstan, at the foot of the Souzka hills, listed from daybreak until after sunset. The mountaineers then, after having obtained a brilliant advantage over the Czar's disciplined troop, regained their inaccessible retreats, loaded with booty, ar:d bringing with them many prisoners. The Avarians rcurned to their tents with 138 prisoners, which they bad made in the Russian ranks.  In the centre of the forest of Boujnaki, in a glade, is a sort of but covered with reeds, which is called the Khan's Cattle. The outside is far from resembling the sumptuous palaces of the Tartar Khans of the Crimea ; but in the inside there is to be found the same Oriental splendour, the same richness, and that abundance arising from subsi,iies and tithes collected by the yatagan in hand. It was on this spot that the Russian prisoners we -e exposed, against whose flight the following precautions were taker. Each prisoner, having his hands strongly bound behind Li 3 back, had besides round Lie neck one of those ropes with a slip knot which the Tartars use to catch wild horses, and which they call arcan. The end of the rope was fixed to a wooden stake driven in the ground. About fifty Avarians, carrying muskets and yalayans, were continually set over the prisoners, whilst at et ery minu e of the day the members or the tribe used to walk about that species of green, eyeing Kith intense curiosity the wretches who we re thus exposed, and endeavouring to recognise their physiognomy, but questioning both in the Tartar klialect and the Russian language. In the Khan's residence the six old men held the'r sittings, to which the former formed part, for there west be seven judges, as well as the summits or white crests of the Elbroouz, which the tribe of Avarians consider as the teat of the disinities that try men af:er their death. After seven days had been devoted to the preliminary formalities of the trial, at the moment when daylight bt gan to appear, an Avarian struck three times. the silver cymbals, which are invariably hung before the Khan's residence. On that signal Mend's- Khan and the six old men came out.