Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

but with that nameless something in his tone and bearing which stamps the man who has ruled men; an enormous Russian merchant, armed to the teeth in triple fur, through which his red visage glows like a fire in a forest; a short, square, keen-looking telegraph inspector, whose dark face bears the legible visé of all weathers, from the ice-winds of the higher Caucasus to the broiling sun of Teheran; an unfortunate lady who "has so many children that she doesn't know what to do;" a plump, placid German Fräulein, with the China blue eyes and treacle-coloured hair which mark Dorothea as infallibly as the rakish cap, thick, turniphued moustache, and huge blunderbuss pipe, characterise Hermann; the inevitable English tourist in the inevitable plaid suit, whose efforts to arrange the strap of his telescope give him the look of an over-fed Laocoon struggling with a peculiarly thin snake; and two or three cadets just "broken out into buttons," discussing, with the boldness and fluency of utter ignorance, all topics from the Khiva Expedition to the last new opera.

So long as we are steaming through the smooth roadstead, all goes well enough; but, once out in the open, the terrible "Minister of the Interior" begins to exact his tribute; and the behaviour of the different races under the ordeal is a curious study. The Russian merchant makes preparation for being comfortably ill, with a quiet dignity reminding me of the last scene of Cato; and turns up, after every paroxysm, a vast harvestmoon visage of unruffled placidity. The Frenchman paces the deck for five minutes or so with the jaunty

step of one heading a forlorn-hope-and then suddenly disappears below. The Englishman, thrusting his hands deeper into his pockets, tramps up and down in the teeth of the wind, with that look of stern resolution worn by John Bull when dancing a quadrille, or discharging any other painful duty. The Turk pulls his turban over his broad, patient, weather-beaten face, and cowers closer into his warm corner beside the funnel; the Tartar coils himself up, and goes comfortably to sleep, with his feet in a basket of oranges and his head in a pool of dirty water; the jaunty cadets hang limply over the bulwark, too miserable to care about keeping up appearances any longer; while the little Fräulein assumes a pose of charming helplessness, and swallows dried prunes by the dozen.

But just at present I have no leisure to note the surrounding havoc, for the Russian officer (with whom, as my cabin-fellow, I have already scraped acquaintance) is now beginning to open out upon Central Asia in a way well worth hearing.

"Turkestan is to us what Algeria has been to France -a kind of training-school for more serious work. A good many of our young officers will learn their first lessons from this expedition, and be all the better for it; but, taken altogether, Asiatic warfare is hardly a good school for European soldiers."

"Why not? no European war could well give them a rougher seasoning."

"Yes, it teaches them to bear hardship, there's no denying that; but, on the other hand, it accustoms them

to see the enemy give way easily, which is always bad practice. If you were to take a corps d'armée which had fought only with Sarts, or Khivans, or Bokhariotes, and suddenly put it face to face with a German or an English army, it would be almost as severe a trial as the first time under fire. However, this Khiva business will be a light affair; and we have made very complete preparations."

"In what way, may I ask?"

"Well, in the first place, we've got camels enough to carry not only the stores, but the infantry as well, at two to each beast. Then we have medical stores at Kazalinsk (Fort No. 1), more than enough for the whole expedition; and Dr Grimm (whom I dare say you've heard of) to take charge of the field hospital. As for the food and water, they 've been measured as carefully as a dose of medicine; and along the dry river-beds, our pumps on the Norton system are sure to find more water, if need be. We've requisitioned a lot of Kirghiz, too, who are always useful on the steppes; and the march of the columns has been timed so as to get over the worst part before the change of the season."

"And what route do they take then?"

"This map will show you that. I've just been pencilling all the lines of march on it. The first column (General Verevkin's) strikes almost due south from Orenburg to the Emba Post, and thence down along the western shore of the Aral Sea,-just Perovski's march, in fact, in 1839-40. The second column (Col. Goloff's) starts from Fort No. 1, near the mouth of the

Syr-Daria, keeping southward to the Boukan hills, where it is to join column 3* (Kaufmann's), which comes eastward from Djizak-over yonder, between Tashkent and Samarcand. The fourth column (Col. Lomakin's) marches due east from Kinderli Bay (down here, on the eastern shore of the Caspian, just south of Mangishlak), meeting the Orenburg column near Cape Ourga, on the Aral Sea. The fifth column (Col. Markozoff's), moves from Tchikishliar (just north of the Attreck yonder, at the south-eastern corner of the Caspian), to strike the ancient bed of the Oxus, and march along it right into the Khanate."

"But surely the distances are very unequal?"

"Very unequal indeed. By the caravan route Khiva is 377 miles from Fort No. 1, 485 from Kinderli Bay, 535 from Djizak, 551 from Tchikishliar, 879 from Orenburg; but as our troops will most likely make several détours, you may add a little more in every case. One thing's certain, at least—if we can get across the desert without much loss, we shall make very short work of the actual fighting. The Khan himself is almost certain to run for it as soon as we get within range of him; and, besides, we've got plenty of infantry this time."

"Is it so much wanted, then, in such a campaign? I should hardly have thought it."

"It is, though. Our cavalry in the East is not worth much, as a rule; the Orenburg Cossacks, for example, are just clodhoppers on horseback; but the 'black caps' can't stand against our grenadiers-and no wonder.

* The actual junction took place much farther south.

I'll just tell you a thing I saw myself, when we attacked Djura-Bek at Kitab.* You know, by some mistake or other, the forlorn-hope went in before the supports were ready, and got under a fire that just burned them up like flies a regular butchery, in fact, as bad as the assault of Kars under Mouravieff. Three times we went at it, and three times we were beaten back; I got hit through the thigh, and Abrâmoff† in the head, and several other officers were killed outright; and when the recall was sounded there was barely a third of the storming party left. The minute we turned to retreat, the rascals came out upon us in a swarm. Well, just beside the ditch lay one of our men badly hurt, and another (with a ball in his own hip, too) trying to carry him off, when six of the Shekhri-Sebzians fell upon them at once. What does the fellow do, but lay down his wounded comrade as tenderly as a mother, and then club his piece and fight all six of them single-handed; and when the supports came up, they found him still standing over his friend, with four sabre-cuts beside his first wound-one Shekhri-Sebzian with his skull stove in like an egg-shell, and the five others all at bay. But when we praised him for it afterwards, he only stared, and said, 'What was I to do? I couldn't leave my comrade!'"

At this moment the dinner-bell rings, and we go down together, to face each other across an endless

*The capital of the little principality of Shekhri-Sebz, now yielded to Bokhara.

+ The present Governor of Samarcand.

« AnteriorContinuar »