TARTARS AND ARMENIANS.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume L, Issue 12715, 29 January 1906, Page 5

TARTARS AND ARMENIANS.

The races most often in conflict in the* Russian Caucasus, says Col. C. E. de la Poer Beresford in " Blackwood " for - December, "are the Tartars and Armenians. , .., " The Daghestanis are fierce and jri/1They are Sunni Muhammadans; their women are unveiled. Thi6 race is the most ignorant and backward in the Cau* casus. Its members, like all mountaineers, are hardy, brave, and hospitable towards stirangens. Passionate and quick to strike, they constantly quarrel, amongst (themselves, using kindjal and pistol on the slightest provocation. la 1 the words of one of my guides, " These fellows think no more of taking a human life than a cup of tea.' " These are the Tartars who swarm into Baku, calling the oil-fields their i own.1 Useless to argue that without, foreign capital and intelligence they 1 could never have developed their riches. I Their chief rivals, and now enemies, are i the Armenians. I". '," Wherever there is work to be "done, ,or V kopeck to be earned-in the Caucasus^, the Armenian makes his way. He' tells you his race was conquered neither by Assyrian, Persian, Turk, or Russian;. yet the ancient kingdom of Armenia is 'held partly by each of ..the last^threeHe is certainly not slothful in business*. but in spite of his history of victories L doubt his] solidity in war. ' " When, some years ago, the Kurds, drove 80,000: starving Armenians across. the CRusso-Turkish frontier, of whom. half passed into the province of Karsand half into iErivan, Russia did not kuqw^how to cope*with the mass of misery. The Emperor subscribed two> million roubles (£200,000) out of his private puree for the relief of the sufferers and as much moire was collected in theempire. The Catholics, or Patriarch of the Armenian Church, fed a number of these starving creatures. When I wa» at Etchmiadain, the residence of the OJfcholicos almost under the ..shade of Ararat, I came across many half-faim-ished creatures who fell like wolves ort the rinds of, cheese or egg-shells thatdropped from our phaeton. " To have seen so much of a people's* soa'rows makes one a pro-Armenian. At Bftlis. Dose1 to the Lake of Van, aKurd met one of these unfortunates in the middle of the street, in broad daylight. He was displeased at seeing the Armenian wearing a. dagger, and said to him, 'Give me your kindjal.' The: Armenian, instead of promptly aocedingto his request by giving him oin. of its... cold steel—the proper answer in these countries to such-an impertinent demand —meekly handed the weapon to» his interlocutor. Without a moment's limitation, the Kurd plunged the kindjal into the heart of the .Armenian, who: sank without a groan at his feet! T can give time and place exactly of this^ one of a hundred similar occurrences,' 5